1 MESSAGES OF MUTUAUTY 



WILL 

CHRISTIANITY 

SURVIVE ? 




BY 



HENRY A. BOMBERGER 





QassJiiiLiiii 

Book i ■SiU-r 

GopightN? 

CDFSmiGHT DEPOSIT. 



WILL CHRISTL\NITY SURVIVE? 



MESSAGES OF MUTUALITY 



WILL 

CHRISTIANITY 

SURVIVE 



By Henry A. Bomberger 
■I 

Author of ^'Christianity and Internationalism," 

•'The Top-Notch of History," ''Awake, and Away to Olivet,' 

"Without a Divine Christ," "An American Sunday," 

"National Preparedness," 

And Other Messages of Mutuality 



''I pray thee, then, 
Write me as one that loves 
His fellow men/' 

Abou Ben Adhem. 



PUBLISHED BY 

The Ben Adhem Press 

Bala, Pa. 



35*65- 



Copyright, 1919 

By 

HENRY A. BOMBERGER 

Bala, Pa. 



Obi 29 1919 



©CI.A5a6371 



A 

MESSAGE OF MUTUALITY 

Affectionately Inscribed 

TO 

THE SUSPICIOUS 

By 

A Fellow Wanderer 

In 

The Tumultuous Wilderness 

Of 
A Mendacious Materialism 



APOLOGY 

The author did not originate the question of the 
title: ''Will Christianity Survive?" He merely 
quotes it. 

For he himself would as soon think of askings 
Will the ocean run dry? as he watches the rising tide 
rush up the narrow, slimy sides of some tide-water 
creek; or, Will the sun be utterly consumed by the 
Gila Monster lounging in its fervent rays? 

The only proper question would be this: How 
long will the slime-sided creek withstand the wash- 
ing of that flood, or the venomous reptile possibly 
survive and prosper on that grace? 

When the seas cease their surging, and the 
myriad stars resign their shining, and the planets 
stop their circling, and the music of the spheres is 
hushed, and God is dead, then and not till then will 
the epitaph of Truth be written, and Christianity 
be laid away in the unmarked tomb of eternal 
oblivion. 

Meanwhile: ''The Lord is not slack concern- 
ing his promise, as some men count slackness; but 
is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any 
should perish, but that all should come to repent- 



ence." 



CONTENTS 

Page 

THE WORD IN THE WILDERNESS 9 

KADESH-BARNEA 12 

Ism, Schism and Skepticism 15 

The Confirmation of Folly 18 

The Repudiation of Truth 21 

Suspicion's Inquisition 27 

Redemption's Revival 30 

I. Israel's Plight 33 

The Insufficiency of Man 37 

The Menace of Materialism 41 

A Stupendous Program 43 

The Recovery of Paradise 48 

The Restoration of Partnership 53 

The Destruction of the Golden Calf .... 57 

The Re-establishment of Truth 60 

II. God's Purpose 63 

1 . The Testimony of History 64 

The Whole Lump Leavened 66 

The Transformation of Society 70 

Truth Triumphant 72 

Wonders God Hath Wrought 75 



Page 

2. The Testimony of Philosophy 78 

The Principle of Christianity 81 

Liberty versus Legalism 85 

Salvation by Grace, not by Force . . 89 

Spiritual Power, not Politics 94 

Divine Mercy, not Civil Law 101 

Christ Man's Servant, not His Censor 108 

In Reason's Ear 110 

An Appeal to the Heart 114 

Christianity Cosmopolitan 117 

A Religion of Life and Enterprise . . 119 

3. The Testimony of Revelation 124 

A Voice from Heaven 127 

^Thus Saith the Lord" 130 

History and Science Catching Up . . 134 

The Book of Books 138 

The Folly of Infidelity 141 

The Essential Strength of Revealed 

Truth 146 

The Ever Present Jesus 151 

THE FINAL VICTORY OF FAITH 156 



WILL CHRISTIANITY SURVIVE? 




THE WORD IN THE WILDERNESS 

CROSS the silences of nearly four millen- 
niums, their tumults past, their forgotten 
paths of glory leading to a legion of 
obliterated graves, their pomp and power 
pulverized under the relentless chariot- 
wheels of time, their boast of heraldry, all that 
beauty, all that wealth e'er gave, their poverty, pas- 
sion and pain, their inhumanity to man and infidel- 
ity to God — through all these fateful centuries of 
vanity and vice, this Gospel comes to men today, a 
flash of heavenly light in a dark sky, a revelation of 
the eternal Majesty that rules the stormy winds of 
mortal strife, and manages the raging seas of riot- 
ous rebellion: 

''As truly as I live, all the earth shall 
be filled with the glory of the Lord/' 

And God still reigns; the cross still stands! 

Man falters and falls, his kingdoms come and 
collapse, his nations vaunt themselves and vanish, 
the statesman speaks his pompous piece and passes 
out — but Truth is eternal. Peoples perish, but 
principles persist. Clouds may hide his face for a 
season, but they cannot touch the Sun himself, nor 

9 



stop his shining, nor stay his course in the heavens, 
nor essentially affect his influence either in duration 
or degree. 

Love never faileth; God is love. 

Life prevails; God is life. 

Light is immortal; God is light. 

And the God of love and life and light has 
revealed Himself to men in the person of Jesus 
Christ His Son, whose kingdom is an everlasting 
kingdom — ^^of his government and peace there 
shall be no end." 

Prophecies shall fail, however positive and 
pretentious. 

Tongues shall cease, however brilliant and 
voluble. 

Knowledge shall vanish away, however osten- 
tatious and dogmatic. 

But the faith of God abideth. The hope that 
is in Him is sure and steadfast. His love is with- 
out variableness or shadow of turning. And the 
greatest of these is love — which, of necessity, is per- 
fectly just ; for perfect love could not be imperfectly 
just. 

Christianity is love's offspring and propa- 
ganda. It is the very soul and substance of life and 
liberty, integrity and justice. It is a light that shin- 
eth in a dark place until the day dawn and the 
Daystar arise in the hearts of the redeemed. 

Perish it cannot. Survive it must. For it is 
inherently triumphant. 

When demented men have succeeded in crush- 
ing sunshine with their bloodstained, bauble battle- 

10 



axes, when they have crucified the Pleiades on a 
tinselled cross of childish fancy, and have brought 
in captive all the planets in their turn, with swagger 
and strut; when they have caught up ^^the seven 
seas" in their brazen helmets, and have consumed 
all the air there is with their pompous inhalations, 
and have made the Lord's eternal throne the foot- 
stool of their fret and folly; then w411 Truth be van- 
quished, and the cause of Jesus Christ be turned to 
dust and ashes. 

Meanw^hile let them shoot the silly arrows of 
their wdld delirium and passionate pursuit of self- 
aggrandizement, into the face of the coming storm 
of justice and judgment; they cannot halt its prog- 
ress for an instant, nor divert it even a little from 
its own essential course. 

Above all the Babel of their prattling tongues, 
the boasting tumult of the builders, the conflict of 
their vain conceits, the noise of sanguinary battle^ 
the shouts of the victor and the cries of the victim, 
the surging tides of human strife and competition, 
the crash of empires and the wrecks of time, God 
still reigns, the kingdom of His Son prevails. And 
this is what He says to the offspring of His grace, 
in the still small voice of infinite wisdom and 
Divine compassion: 

'Tear not, little flock. 
For it is your Father's good pleasure 
To give you 
The kingdom." 



11 



KADESH-BARNEA 

But the occasion harks back some thirty cen- 
turies or more, to a time when the hosts of redeemed 
Israel were encamped in the southern borderland of 
Canaan, on an historic spot called Kadesh-barnea. 
With a mighty hand, by signs and wonders, Je- 
hovah had led them from the cruel and humiliating 
bondage of the Egyptian to the outer boundary of 
the fulfillment of a gracious promise and the real- 
ization of a glorious hope. From his tent doorv/ay 
the Jew at last could look out and beyond upon the 
'^sweet fields dressed in living green" concerning 
which God had said to Abraham, eight hundred 
years before, ^'Unto thy seed will I give this land." 

The fact, however, that Israel halted on this 
inspiring vantage ground, though led by ^Hhe 
pillar" of a considerate Providence, instead of 
pressing on to the conquest in accelerated marches, 
seems to indicate, clearly enough, the first falter- 
ings of that triumphant faith which is everywhere 
and always essential to the attainment of the prom- 
ised inheritance. For without such faith ^4t is im- 
possible to pleas€ him" who is the Captain of the 
host of Israel — or to please any one else as a matter 
of fact, or for a man to satisfy the deepest solicita- 
tions of his own immortal soul. 

Through all the long years of sojourn in an 
alien clime under an intolerable oppression, and 
then across the sea of Exodus, and by way of Sinai 
to their present station, these Israelitish multitudes 
had looked forward with yearning desire to what 

12 



was now immediately before them. By it their spirit 
had been stirred with the keenest expectation. 

Yet doubtingly they stopped and staggered at 
the very threshold of their long-sought home, on the 
very eve of the successful consummation of their 
hopeful plans, and consequently gathered to their 
hearts instead despairing grief, when they might 
have added to their personal and national assets the 
realization of the highest aspirations mortal man 
could cherish. 

Backed by memories of Providential interposition 
unprecedented in the experience of any nation, 
beckoned by the alluring prospect of unparalleled 
possessions — ''life, liberty, and the pursuit of hap- 
piness" under the banner of God — they nevertheless 
had hesitated, had set up an inquisition before 
which they brought in the purposes and assurances 
of Jehovah, and finally concluded that it would be 
best to put faith under bond and ''play safe" — their 
Lord still pleading but never preventing their free- 
dom of will and action, for He only makes men free, 
"li you insist on putting the deadly detectives of 
reaction on mv track," He seemed to sav, ''if vou 
prefer suspicion to respect for me and mine, spy on 
— but know thou, that for all these things thou shalt 
receive a just recompense of reward, the wages of 
sedition, fairly earned and fully paid." 

So they had selected spies, and had sent them 
up into the land of promise, with considerable dis- 
play, ostensibly to ascertain the truth (all they as- 
certained was terror and treason), to make a search- 
ing, "scientific" investigation of the "facts" before 

13 



they moved forward to possess it, to make sure that 
Jehovah knew what He was talking about. Hav- 
ing been unwilling to take Him at His Word — 
having presumptuously questioned His competency, 
His wisdom, His veracity and grace — they ap- 
pointed this commission of suspicion to spy out the 
land and render a formal, itemized report in due 
course. Alas, they ''meant business''! — and ''there 
is no sentiment in business," not a bit — nor in a 
bleached bone. 

For every day those spies spent on that errand 
of distrust that people was thrown back a year, 
throwTi back into the wilderness of retribution, to 
languish, and to learn that ''the just shall live by 
faith'' and not by infidelity, by loyalty and not by 
sedition, by Mutuality and not by Schism, by part- 
nership and not by competition. 

And it may be noted at once that quite nat- 
urally the investigation commission split on the 
issue; for Schism and Skepticism are one and in- 
separable, the quintessence of sin, the source and 
substance of disaster, the one and only thing from 
which the human race has suffered. There is and 
can be no agreement between the temple of Godly 
fidelity and the idols of factitious inquisition. Each 
commissioner found what he was looking for. 
Those that were looking for trouble found it; and 
those that were looking for what God had set be- 
fore them found that. The prospect was depicted 
and interpreted by each man's state of mind, and 
each was sure that his conclusions were correct. 

14 



Ism, Schism and Skepticism 

The obstructionist found mountainous obstruc- 
tions where the lover of things that are lovely 
plucked mountain pinks and trailing arbutus, and 
joyously reached the summit while the other, in the 
valley below, continued to struggle and scowl over 
exact mathematical measurements of the ^ ^practical'' 
impossibilities presented by the towering impedi- 
ment before him. The censor announced dark spots 
on the sun, while grace raised roses in its life-giving 
effulgence. Thanklessness cursed what was not 
there, while gratitude sang over what there was, 

A false science discovered giants where true 
faith found only fruits. The skeptic laboriously 
charted a desert of despair while the grateful be- 
liever garnered a golden harvest of joy on the very 
same spot. One saw insuperable difficulties and 
hopeless defeat wiiere the other saw only an open 
highway to prosperity and peace. To one the chil- 
dren of God were as ^'grasshoppers''; to the other 
they were a mighty host well able to go on and take 
possession of the Divine promise. 

The majority ruled; and the majority was wrong, 
as it always is, unless ruled in turn by the wisdom 
and grace of God. And that people reaped what 
it planted, in strict fulfillment of an inexorable law 
— for ''lawlessness'' is fatuous, it does not in fact 
exist. 

The open sea in a furious storm may be to some 
the symbol of anarchy; but there is not a ripple of 
it, nor a wave of it, not a mountainous billow of it, 

15 



nor a fleck of foam tossed from its tumultuous 
breast, that is not hound by law. ''The wages of 
sin is death," not because God says it is; but be- 
cause it is God says it. He graciously advises man 
of the lawful and incontrovertible fact. Whatever 
the theological statement of it may be, this is the 
practical statement of it; and this statement of it is 
correct. Why should the everywhere-present God 
continue to be densely befogged by this human con- 
trivance called the ''science" of God? It is no won- 
der the world is beginning to cry out, "To Hell with 
your theology!" — as the late Joseph Parker once 
exclaimed in his pulpit in the London City Temple 
to a congregation of ministers. "The soul that sin- 
neth it shall die"; and if God had not put this warn- 
ing in His gracious Word the fact would still per- 
sist. The danger-signal denotes the thing signal- 
ized, and does not devise it. Repudiation of the 
record of a natural law does not alter the law. It is 
the law that makes the record of it possible, not the 
record that makes the law a possibility. 

Philosophy, the science of principles, may be 
completely "scrapped," the principles with which it 
pretends to deal stand four-square still. Man can- 
not destroy an historic fact by destroying the his- 
torical account of it. Fire will burn baby's hand 
w^hether father tells baby so or not; but it is very 
wise and good of father to tell baby so — and only 
a fool will attempt to dispose of the fact by trying 
to kill off father. This world has never known such 
unmitigated nonsense as is displayed in the effort 
to wipe out the stellar universe by burning all the 

16 



books on astronomy, to charge off the fact of sin 
and its wages by scoffing at the Biblical record of 
that fact, to eradicate death by closing the ceme- 
teries, or to get rid of God by bringing the Divine 
revelation of God into disrepute and ridicule. 

So lawlessness is fatuous; and the most slavish, 
law-bound people on this old sin-cursed planet are 
those w^ho claim to be most free, who call them- 
selves '^Anarchists," ''free" lovers and "free" think- 
ers ; who repudiate law, and who would exterminate 
law by making their own word law — they are bound 
with the most merciless chains by the law of license, 
by the ruthless law of their own lust. 

It would be difficult to form an adequate con- 
ception of the intense strain under which, for forty 
days, the historic host of Israel awaited the return 
of the twelve men commissioned to "spy out" the 
land of liberty ere they, the freedmen of God, should 
enter. Nervous tension is an invariable corollary 
of suspicion. Prostration is the certain offspring 
of distrust. Between Skepticism and peace there is 
eternal disagreement. Confidence alone creates con- 
tentment. Faith is the substance of things hoped 
for; it profits today by the fruits of tomorrow; with 
the assured compensations of the future it turns the 
laborious toils of the present into a gracious 
inspiration. 

But at last the dubious mission had been accom- 
plished. The spies had returned, some bearing the 
luscious grapes of Eschol, others bearing only the 
cankerous ingratitude of infidelity. Possessed of 
that counterfeit confidence which trusts God only 

17 



with disastrous reservations, the latter had resolved 
to take no risks; so they risked everything on their 
own distorted vision, cowardice and perversity. 
Parting from faith, which risks nothing, they would 
ascertain the facts; so they found nothing but a 
fiction — and the people fell for their faithlessness. 

The Confirmation of Folly 

Eager to hear whatever word the commissioners 
might bring concerning the country that was to be 
its future abode, the camp crowded around them. 
The over- anxious, hesitating millions wondered if 
the report of the spies would confirm the Word of 
Jehovah, to wit, that He would lead this people 
^'unto a land flowing with milk and honey." 

But unbelief has never confirmed anything hut 
folly. It plants nothing but petulence, and it reaps 
nothing but poverty and wretchedness. Moreover 
it is quite likely that most of them maintained a 
thinly-disguised reserve, an attitude of pretentious 
superiority, that would be able to say, ^^I told you 
so," to any report the spies might submit. Thus 
does cowardice crawl and flatter itself with being 
cautious and conservative. And thus does a boast- 
ing Skepticism slip on a snail and plunge into a 
hopeless pit. 

Yet right at hand appeared, at least the possi- 
bility of unprecedented domestic prosperity, and 
complete vindication of their popular claim, not 
only to national existence, but also to national pre- 
eminence. Certainly after so many years of hu- 
miliation and suffering at the hands of idolatrous 

18 



taskmasters, the alluring prospect caused the Jew- 
ish heart to beat high and warm notwithstanding 
the lurking suspicion of God's integrity and power; 
and notwithstanding the fact that they had evi- 
dently resolved, in any event, to accept the testi- 
mony of a majority of these fitting representatives of 
their distrust even if they had to cast into the ever- 
lasting discard the Divine deliverances of their 
gracious God. 

Thus faith falters, and thus do men ^^play safe." 
And thus are their highest ambitions beaten, their 
noblest aspirations consumed in the furnace of sus- 
picion, to their consequent dismay. 

Ten of the twelve spies were untrue to both God 
and country. Skepticism is no respecter of persons, 
times y or places; it does not stop to pick the object 
of its distrust. It is simply faithless; as faithless to 
its fellow men as it is to its God and to itself. It is 
utterly untrustworthy in all the relations of life, in 
church and state, at home and abroad; in its social 
fellowships and its commercial dealings. The 
venom of suspicion courses through all the arteries 
of its being and manifests itself in every sphere of 
its mental, emotional and practical activities. 

These ten men shared the cringing, compromising 
spirit of their constituents. And with no little eclat 
they rendered a report contrary to the evidence, but 
in keeping with that spirit, an ^^evil report," a re- 
port carefully calculated to please the people how- 
ever false to the facts. And they are doing it yet! 
Rather than lose a customer, a subscriber, or a 
popular election, they would give God the lie and 

19 



die in the desert. Rather than risk their standing, 
place, or position before the public, they would per- 
jure themselves, libel their neighbors, see God for- 
saken, and the nation wrecked in a wilderness of 
pusillanimous politics, prostituted publicity, and 
licentious Commercialism. 

^'The land eateth up the inhabitants thereof" is 
what they said; but it was not true. '^And there we 
saw the giants, the sons of Anak" — this is what 
they said; but what they said was an insidious fic- 
tion. ^'We were in our own sight as grasshoppers, 
and so were we in their sight'' — thus they reported; 
but their report was of the very essence of diplo- 
matic deceit. They won their point, however — and 
their popularity was sealed at once, transient though 
it proved to be. 

For evil reports, from time immemorial, like an 
infectious pestilence, have spread with marvelous 
rapidity. Man has seemed ever ready to embrace 
them, and to multiply the tumult of their mendacity. 
The truth he crushes, but a lie exalts. Veracity he 
crucifies, but duplicity applauds. 

Instantly, therefore, was the whole camp in an 
uproar — over what was not there I Every man saw 
double. The harmless little lizard at his feet was 
a boa-constrictor; each honey-bee a buzzard; the 
bark of a dog the bellowing of some monster of 
destruction; the chirp of a cricket on the hearth the 
resounding crack of doom. x\nd consternation 
reigned supreme. 

The world never raises a riot over righteousness. 
Truth is rarely its piece de resistance. That would 

20 



not do; no, no! Yet it will raise Hell over some 
hallucination. So a frenzy of fear filled every soul. 
The alarm spread with the violence of fire. Anger 
entered the lists and wrestled with despair in a mad 
struggle for the mastery. Had the hostile chariots 
of Pharoah surprised them they scarcely would have 
been thrown into such a sudden fit of agitation. 
(Suspicion bears its fruits no less than faith.) 
They could sense nothing but impending disaster. 
^^And all the congregation lifted up their voice, 
and cried; and the people wept that night." They 
murmured bitterly against their trusty leaders. 
They declared that they had been beaten and bun- 
coed. ''Would God that we had died in the land of 
Egypt," they exclaimed; ''or, Would God we had 
died in this wilderness! Wherefore hath the Lord 
brought us unto this land to fall by the sword, that 
our wives and our children should be a prey? And 
they said one to another, Let us make a captain, 
and let us return into Egypt" — into bondage, into 
idolatry and degradation, into apostasy and death! 
— And they are saying it yet ! 

The Repudiation of Truth 

In vain did valient Joshua and Caleb try to quell 
the riot, dismiss the terror of the multitude, nail 
the fiction, establish the truth, appease the anger of 
the people and turn the historic tide of rebellion. 
Though but two to ten, they nevertheless pro- 
nounced the majority report of their cowardly asso- 
ciates (there is nothing more cowardly than a lie, 
nothing more courageous than the truth) a libelous 

21 



publication, a malicious perversion of probity and 
patriotism. They were men of vision, and not case- 
hardened materialists — men of unquestioned in- 
tegrity, and not obsequious politicians. They had 
clean cut convictions, and the manly valor to make 
an open stand for those convictions at any cost. 
They avowed that they had beheld nothing in the 
land that did not fully tally with Jehovah's guar- 
antees. And they said, "Let us go up at once and 
possess it; for we are well able to overcome it. And 
they rent their clothes, saying. The land w^e passed 
through to search it, is an exceeding good land, a 
land that floweth with milk and honey ; neither fear 
ye the people of the land ; for they are bread for us ; 
their defence is departed from them." 

But an unbelieving and revolutionary Material- 
ism regards the man of ideals a dunce, though he 
holds a sceptre that all the principalities of earth 
and powers of Hell cannot destroy; apart from 
which the wisdom of the world is a w41d delirium 
and the might of man a silly delusion. Ideals live; 
but Materialism crumbles into noxious dust in 
every time of crisis. 

A simple beatitude, closely woven into the fabric 
of civic life, has greater strength by far than fleets 
of massive steel could possibly possess, or a seasoned 
army of ten million men. Force, too, is fatuous, 
though it be ''force to the limit and without stint,'' 
It has never fought a fight and finally w^on it — 
never once in all the force-besotted centuries of hu- 
man history. Its winnings are Will-o-wisps, luring 
the infatuated winners deeper and deeper into the 

22 



bogs of rebellion. It is not the only language man 
can understand, however brutal he may be. Eternal 
love is the universal tongue that no man need inter- 
pret or translate — the Esperanto of a world re- 
deemed. Faith is the victory that overcomes the 
world. Confidence is the coin that captivates. 
Force precipitates confusion worse confounded, 
rancor and revenge ; while faithful love lifts all men 
out of Bedlam into peace-possessing bliss. 

So the true and trusty testimony of the self- 
forgetful spies did not prevail. On the contrary 
^^all the people bade stone them/' — Alas for democ^ 
racy from which God is eliminated, and in which 
the testimony of Truth, and of fidelity to Truth, is 
received with scornful maledictions! -^ 

It was in the midst of this crisis that ^^the glory of 
the Lord appeared in the tabernacle of the congre- 
gation before all the children of Israel." — That 
glory lingers yet, if men will but see it. — In Divine 
indignation God threatened to cast off and destroy 
His rebellious people; for they had first cast Him 
off and sought to destroy His authority. Said He 
to Moses, ^T will smite them with the pestilence, 
and disinherit them" — the pestilence of their own 
perversity, the repudiation of their own rebellion. 

But ^^the effectual fervent prayer of a righteous 
man availeth much." And Moses prayed — when 
all else failed, he prayed; and thus he prayed: 

'7 beseech thee, let the power of my Lord 
be great, according as thou hast spoken, 
saying, The Lord is longsufjering, and of 
great mercy, forgiving iniquity and trans- 

23 



gression, and by no means clearing the 
guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers 
upon the children unto the third and 
fourth generation. Pardon, I beseech 
thee, the iniquity of this people according 
unto the greatness of thy mercy, and as 
thou hast forgiven this people, from 
Egypt even until now,'^ 

Thus Moses prayed. He besought God on their 
behalf. And God heard his prayer. Nevertheless 
it pleased God in His wisdom and grace (yea, in 
His grace) that these people should receive the just 
wages of their infidelity. 

There is no grace in injustice; and infidelity, 
which is the mother of all sin, is entitled to receive, 
with all things else, what it has earned, in spite of 
the fact that Godly fidelity is the crowning glory of 
the universe, the very soul of salvation, the very 
substance of life and liberty, of love, joy and peace, 
of law and order, while in- fidelity is the sword of 
dissension, the sum total of heresy, sedition and 
suicide. 

Therefore Jehovah answered thus: ^^Your dead 
bodies shall fall in this wilderness; and your chil- 
dren shall be wanderers in the wilderness forty 
years, and bear your whoredoms." Justice and 
judgment are the habitation of His throne; and they 
are not found elsewhere. 

^'Would God we had died in this wilderness!'' 
they had cried out in rebellious disloyalty. And 
God, in His infinite grace, gave them what they had 
desired, though they had desired it with so much 

24 



traitorous insolence. He would be loyal even if 
they were not ; so He granted them the thing that of 
their own free will they had wished for, the thing 
from which He was graciously leading them, not 
arrogantly driving them — the very thing against 
which He had mercifully warned them, to wit: to 
die in this wilderness. He ftever obstructs man's 
freedom of choice and action, and He only; for He 
only is faithful and true, loyal and just. 

But such is the perversity of human nature in its 
present sinful state, that man never wants what he 
wanted after that thing has ceased to be a want and 
has become a realization. He dislikes honest toil, 
but clings with the greatest tenacity and conten- 
tion to its honest wages, and constantly clamors to 
have these increased. On the contrary he holds 
fast to sin with similar tenacity and protestation, 
but passionately dislikes its dues, and violently blas- 
phemes the name of Him who assuredly pays him 
what he has justly earned. While he riotously cries 
for justice, he hates it with his whole deluded soul. 

Of his owTi volition man breaks away from God, 
who made him free to break away if he would ; and 
when this sin of wilful secession finally fetters and 
mocks him — ^^Thy calf, O Samaria, has cast thee 
off" — he turns upon God as only a rebel could, 
reviles Him for allowing what would have caused 
him to curse God for withholding, and which God 
could not withhold without robbing man of the very 
liberty which He Himself gave him; and he menda- 
ciously blames God for the bondage he freely and 
deliberately brought upon himself. 

25 



This very day one of the violent advocates of 
what his entire class loosely calls ''personal liberty" 
was conversing volubly on this favorite theme. And 
before the sadly misguided man had finished his 
incoherent and illogical discourse, he began to be- 
rate God ("ii there is a God," he said) for permit- 
ting the recent European war. ''If those people 
chose to make war," the scoffer was asked, "and if 
they arrogantly insisted on making war, in spite of 
every plea and protest, in defiance of all right and 
reason, how could God stop them without arbitrarily 
interfering with their 'personal liberty' to do as they 
pleased?" He had not seen the glaring inconsis- 
tency of his curious argument. It was quite evi- 
dent, as a matter of fact, that he was perfectly will- 
ing that God should forcefully interfere with the 
liberties of other people, but not with his liberty. 
Indeed he insolently held God to account for not 
doing the very thing against which he had been 
violently protesting ; in all of which he fairly repre- 
sented the Socialistic class of agitators to which he 
belonged; a class that heatedly advocates an equal 
division of the million dollars it does not possess, 
or the two motor cars it does not own; but when it 
comes to making a like division or its two goats — 
well, the very proposition is another intolerable out- 
rage on its so-called "rights"! 

How pitiful the delusion of these who constantly 
cry out for "social and industrial justice," and other 
varieties of so-called "justice" — justice? Before 
God there is at least one man in the world who does 
not want justice, either from God or his fellow men. 

26 



This one man wants only forgiveness and mercy. 
God forbid that this man should be dealt wdth 
justly I God grant that he may be dealt with only 
in mercy and grace. '^We do not want charity, but 
justice" — this is the most bitter contention of a great 
multitude of deluded men. But there is at least one 
man in the world (for whom alone the WTiter is 
authorized to speak) who asks nothing of his fellow 
men, or of God, but forbearance and charity. — This 
howling wilderness of slavery and death is not of 
Divine ordering, but is altogether of man's own free 
choice and making. 

So there presently arose this solicitous inquiry: 
Will God's cause survive? 

Suspicion's Inquisition 

How completely transformed was the prospect! 
From ^^living green" they turned to barren sand, 
from the land of promise to the desert of retribution, 
from a door of hope to a dungeon of despair, from 
what God wanted to what they wanted. Destruction 
stared them in the face. Their national pride an 
object of derision, their domestic aspirations appar- 
ently transmuted into a muddle, the fame of their 
Providential deliverance changed over night into a 
universal laughing-stock, they turned their crest- 
fallen faces toward the towering, sunburnt rocks and 
dreary wastes of the torrid south, and entered upon 
an experience unparalleled in all the strange annals 
of national history. 

Would boasted Sinai prove their sepulcher, the 
''tables of stone" the markers of their tomb ? Would 

27 



the manna of God's grace rise up and mock them in 
the midst of circumstances that simply seemed to 
memorialize a childish credulity that only foolish 
men call ''faith"? Would the gushing waters from 
''the rock in Horeb" overwhelm their souls with the 
deadly disappointments of a desert mirage? Was 
the pillar of fire but a fatuous Jack-o-lantern, the 
pillar of cloud a vaporous hallucination, leading 
them by slow degrees into desolations of disaster 
from which there would be no possible escape? Had 
the Law been simply a lariat that some wretched fate 
had used to rope and tie them, to subdue the exer- 
cise of liberty and to strangle their pursuit of happi- 
ness? Would the monstrous Materialism by which 
they were surrounded, its jagged peaks impiously 
piercing the skies, its serrated spurs cutting their 
way deep down into the very vitals of the camp it- 
self — would it ultimately crush them? Had God 
indeed forsaken them? Was He only a merciless 
tyrant after all? Their enemies said He was. Were 
they correct? Or it may be He was not even a per- 
sonal entity, but only an idea, an abnormal mental 
image, an absurb delirium? And the voice that had 
led them forth to alluring nationality, to life and 
liberty, was it but the siren call of some religious or 
patriotic Fanaticism? 

These were some of the ominous considerations 
that no doubt filled their souls with inexpressible 
dismay. 

But God was neither dead nor asleep. He was 
neither a myth nor a monster. The God who called 
Abraham from Ur of the Chaldees, the God whom 

28 



Abraham knew better, more intimately, more intelli- 
gently, than men know each other — the God of their 
fathers had not forgotten His promise, He had not 
forgotten His faithless flock, nor ceased to love it, 
as God only can love lost men. Like as a father 
pitieth his children so the Lord pitieth them — as 
they thus face the fruits of their own free choice. 
He doth not always chide, neither doth He keep His 
anger forever. And He hastens to their deliverance 
with this inspiring, yet apparently preposterous 
prophecy: ^^As truly as I live, all the earth shall 
be filled with the glory of the Lord." — 'Tear ye not, 
O Israel; neither be thou dismayed; I have re- 
deemed thee." 

And the sons of Anak laughed in derision. 

Where is the warrant for such a sweeping prom- 
ise? Produce your collateral evidence, O Israel! — 
God's Word for it? God's Word does not command 
a copper at the Bank of Anakia. — But God's Word, 
without further security, is a thousand times better 
than a judgment note accompanied with government 
bonds. — Not here. — Governments default, empires 
pass away, hut the Word of God has met every 
obligation without postponement since the beginning 
of time, and it is going stronger than ever; mean- 
while the oldest national flag in the world has not 
yet celebrated its sesqui-centennial. — Sorry, but 
your security must be marketable. Have you any 
real estate to pledge? — Not a shingle. — Have you 
no convertible credit of any sort to offer ? — Only the 
personal integrity of Almighty God. — Perhaps some 
friend will endorse you? — We are friendless refugees 

29 



from Egypt; we seek a country, and a home. — Have 
you no personal property of value? — We have a 
building of God, a house not made with hands, 
eternal in the heavens. — Where's heaven — anywhere 
within the limits of Cook County? — No; heaven is 
on the other side of Jordan. — Too remote entirely; 
moreover the finance committee would not accept 
such an offer as that, it is entirely too intangible. 
Anything else? — Not a hoof. — Good night! 

Yea, out into the dark night, alas! while the 
crackling laughter of the Godless giants of a crass 
Commercialism, echoing across the wide wastes of 
the desert from behind bolted bronze doors, chills 
their stricken souls with deadly fear. 

God's Word for it was their only warrant. So 
the tender was rejected as a bad risk, lacking the 
tangible collateral of an adulterous Materialism. — 
Yet had they other warrant for it, as we shall see. 

Look to yonder light! It is the pillar of fire! 
God still lives ! And the Levites chant a recessional : 
"Fear ye not, O Israel; neither be thou dismayed; 
I have redeemed thee; I have called thee by my 
name ; thou art mine. As truly as I live, all the earth 
shall be filled with the glory of the Lord." — And His 
people sleep in peace, till the Day dawTi! 
Redemption's Revival 

Thirty-five centuries have passed; and His peo- 
ple have no fear ; they rest upon the promise of Him 
who never breaks faith, but keeps His Word with- 
out defalcation. The same giants still deride them, 
the same gross Sensualism still mocks them ; but His 
people rest in peace. Disloyalty discredits them; 

30 



but they rest in peace. They know that their God 
is awake — that ''the Lord is mindful of his own, he 
remembers his people." — False prophets scent dis- 
aster. Cowardly outposts seek to undermine the 
confidence of the camp with perjured reports of ap- 
proaching ruin. The rude rumble of Egyptian 
chariot wheels has not died out. A wilderness of 
Agnosticism confronts them, cacti and sage-brush, 
rattlesnakes and venomous lizards, hypocrisy and 
Cynicism, beasts and buzzards. A great wdde sea 
of worldliness and lust surges by the side of them, 
its boisterous waves constantly washing up into the 
very Sanctuary of their God. Heresy and Schism 
beat upon their citadel of truth in riotous revolution. 

A massive and mendacious Materialism swash- 
buckles in all the avenues of life around them. The 
very elect spy upon the Almighty with arrogant dis- 
trust of His Divine wasdom and grace. Insidious 
infidelity, to God and man, one and inseparable, 
subsidizes and prostitutes all the larger institutions 
of publicity. ''The Almighty Dollar," with imperial 
selfishness, stops the progress of benevolence with 
callous, autocratic injunctions; and human society 
is torn with ruthless animosities, class contentions, 
insane competitions, race hatreds, a narrow, case- 
hardened Nationalism, a Babel of conflicting states- 
manship, delirious schemes of social order, conceived 
and promoted in dis-ordtr, all mingled with varying 
degrees and sorts of pusillanimous Patriotism and 
partisan politics that reek with corruption. 

Will the Kingdom of Christ survive in the pres- 
ence of such appalling conditions? Anxiously the 

31 



redeemed look hither and yon for some ray of light, 
for some message of Mutuality and cheer. They 
call upon the God of their fathers to lift up a stan- 
dard against these opposing hosts that all may see 
and understand, to confirm their tottering faith, to 
revive their drooping, war-weary souls, to strengthen 
the feeble knees of their good intentions. ^'How 
long, O Lord, how long!" is the languishing cry 
that stirs the silent watches of the night under the 
whole circle of the heavens, across the seas, in tropic 
heat and arctic cold, even unto the ends of the earth. 
And, lo! ^'the pillar" of His presence, cloud by 
day, fire by night, appears above the tabernacle of 
the congregation. His Word does not return unto 
Him void. It tarries — ^has tarried through all the 
centuries — lest His people forget, lest they fall by 
the way. Above all the noise of battle, the ribald 
shouts of the counsellors of Godlessness, the tumult 
of lust and the savage shambles of a vain struggle 
for so-called position and power. His voice is heard. 
And this is what He says to His beloved: ^^As truly 
as I live, all the earth shall be filled with the glory 
of the Lord. — Let not your heart be troubled, neither 
let it be afraid." — And His people are at peace, till 
the Day dawTi — a peace w^hich ^^passeth all under- 
standing." 



Two matters of vital importance, arising out of 
the midst of the present crisis, demand considera- 
tion: the first is Israel's plight; the second, God's 
purpose. 

32 



I. ISRAEL'S PLIGHT 

Every predicament the human race has experienced 
in six thousand years has been the legitimate off- 
spring of in-fidelity. Man did not fall in the first 
place until infidelity tripped him up. When he re- 
nounced his faith in God he fell. Indeed, faithless- 
ness itself was his fall, and not the thing that com- 
monly passes as 'immorality." Infidelity was his 
undoing, which is the one and only thing that is 
fundamentally and essentially immoral. And as 
soon as he lost faith in God, he lost faith in himself, 
and in his fellow man ; for no man trusts his fellow 
man who does not trust his God ; and the man who 
does not trust his God is not to be trusted, even his 
faith in himself is an artificial camouflage. 

When the faith of God becomes once more the 
dominating factor in human life, then will man have 
faith in his fellow man, and in himself, and neither 
he himself nor his fellow man will betray that faith. 
Then will discord and death, death and discord 
(two things that are inseparably joined together in 
the nether foundations of infidelity) — then will 
temporal and eternal decomposition — social, intel- 
lectual, spiritual and physical decay — ^'be swal- 
lowed up in victory." Then will the redeemed cry 
aloud for joy, '^O death, where is thy sting? O 
grave, where is thy victory?" 

''The sting of death is sin," and sin is separation 
from God, which is nothing more or less than di- 
vision, discord, enmity and strife. And this is death 
— man's "last enemy that shall be destroyed," man's 
first enemy, man's only enemy — decomposition, past, 

33 



present and future — Ism, Schism and Skepticism, 
these three; and the greatest of these is Skepticism, 
for it is in this that the others originate. 

Death is disintegration, the dissolution of part- 
nership, and the setting up of destructive competi- 
tion in its place and stead. And this is war. War is 
hell. Hell is war — eternal conflict, everlasting di- 
vision and disagreement, unending social, spiritual 
and physical decomposition, with all the elements 
engaged in Devilish antagonisms, confidence ban- 
ished, self supreme, license the only law, emulations, 
variance, hatreds and malice all unleashed, amid the 
tumult of contending classes, the sanguinary sword 
of unsparing hostility in full swing and unre- 
strained, every man a Cain armed with the fiendish 
club of fratricide, frightfulness triumphant, where 
their worm of corruption doth not die and the fire of 
their fierce violence is not quenched, and they fight 
on forever, without let or hindrance, without a Day 
of Worship, without a Sanctuary, without a Savior, 
and without hope. 

Once ^^ there was war in heaven." It was when 
Satan cut loose from his partnership with God and 
substituted competition for communion, discord for 
harmony, Schism for Mutuality, petulence for peace, 
ingratitude for gladness; when jealousy of God's 
place and power possessed him, and he set out to 
destroy the One who was his senior partner, his 
Creator in fact, but whose competitor he then pre- 
ferred to be — set out to take His place, usurp His 
power, ruin His credit and steal His trade. 

34 



^'Who made the Devil?'' an insolent cynic has 
asked. The answer is made so plain that he who 
reads may run: Like his friend, the cynic, the Devil 
made himself. He is the original model of the '^ Self- 
made'' man. God made Satan, made him free (as 
He only makes a creature free) — free to make of 
himself what he w^ould; and he made the Devil of 
himself. 

And who made Hell? That same old Serpent, 
the Devil, made Hell; and he did it of his own 
volition. He made it because he and his could not 
live agreeably in heaven. And thither they go, go 
freely, yet spitefully; because they like lying and 
violence, riot, revolution, competition and strife, 
license, lust, infidelity and disgrace; in spite of God 
they go, in spite of God's protests, in spite of God's 
infinite love, and in spite of the fact that God gave 
His only begotten Son to save them from it. To 
one of his character, disposition and habits, Heaven 
itself would be Hell to the Devil, could we imagine 
his being domiciled there. 

Israel's plight is therefore synonymous with her 
infidelity. And, humanly speaking, there seems to 
be at hand some reasonable excuse for Skepticism. 

The people of God, in themselves, like other men, 
are poor, weak, lost mortals. As such they differ 
from other men only in the fact that they confess it, 
w^hile other men do not ; they are deeply conscious of 
their insufficiency, failure and hopeless condition, 
while other men are not. They do not profess good- 
ness. It is one of the Devil's most cunning and fa- 
miliar lies to say that they do. They profess only 

35 



Jesus Christ! They are not professing Christians 
because of their virtue, but because of their admitted 
lack of it. Judicially (as they stand before the bar 
of Divine justice '^in Him") they are saints. But 
experimentally (as day by day they stand face to 
face with their conscious failure and personal worth- 
lessness) they are sinners. Out of Christ they have 
no merit, and they publicly confess it. Other men 
think they are all right. The Christian knows that 
in himself he is all wrong. He is keenly sensible 
of the fact that, in himself, he is not equal to life's 
critical emergencies. Other men think they are; and 
they go on building rebellious Babels. 

Therefore the Christian is prone to shrink back 
from barriers so bold, from towering cliffs that seem 
humanly insurmountable — and that cannot be 
scaled, as a matter of fact, except by Divine inter- 
position. He pleads as did Moses: ^Who am I, 
that I should go unto Pharoah, and that I should 
bring forth the children of Israel out of Egypt?" 
With Gideon, that ^^mighty man of valor," he ex- 
claims: ^^O, my Lord, wherewith shall I save Israel? 
behold my family is poor in Manasseh, and I am 
the least in my father's house." Or like Simon 
Peter he falls at the feet of Jesus with this confes- 
sion: ^^Depart from me, O Lord, for I am a sinful 



man." 



From a strictly human point of view, Skepticism, 
of this sort at least, may not be dealt with too 
harshly, for it may not be wholly lacking in sub- 
stantial virtue; it may be essentially an expression 
of a perfectly genuine yet faltering faith, of the 

36 



awakening realization of truth, the first struggling 
effort to get away from the conscious insufficiency 
of self and lay hold upon Him who is man's only 
hope of salvation. 

The Insufficiency of Man 

The man of God is intensely impressed with his 
utter insignificance as he laboriously threads his 
way through a crushing throng of obstructing cir- 
cumstances. In ^'the press" of hindrances, that lift 
big shoulders high above him, like Zaccheus of old 
he realizes that he is exceeding ^^small of stature." 
All the ambitious ingenuity of the human mind, all 
the industry that human hands can possibly display, 
all the material resources that human fortune can 
possibly provide, have never yet been able to build 
^^a tower whose top may reach unto heaven," that 
shall rise above the essential shortcomings and ne- 
cessities of human life, that shall enable man to 
escape from the floods, fires and pestilences of sin. 
The best that man of himself can do but leads to a 
confusion of tongues, a riot of counsel, division, dis- 
persion and disaster. All his pretentions lead at last 
to some mausoleum, artistically sculptured it may 
be, yet the abode of decomposition. All his high- 
sounding philosophies are resolved at last into the 
tinkling toys of childishness or imbecility. And 
there is no way out of the evils that beset him, the 
difficulties that surround him, the hostile hosts that 
encompass him, the corruptions and incompetencies 
that make up the sum total of his own inner being 
and life — no way out, except in Him who said, "I 

37 



am the way, the truth and the life: no man cometh 
unto the Father but by me"; and no man cometh 
unto the land of promise, where love prevails, where 
grace and gratitude abound, and perfect faith is 
found, and Jesus Christ is on the throne supreme, 
by any other path — he that ''climbeth up some other 
way, the same is a thief and a robber." 

No wonder Israel is in doubt and dismay as she 
looks in upon her ineffectual personal forces and 
numbers them against the principalities and pow- 
ers that are violently opposed to her, as she spreads 
the scant supplies of her humanity on the insatiable 
floor of a seemingly boundless desert, as she looks 
upon the imperious heights of the menacing Mate- 
rialism that rises around her. 

Moreover, to the awakening human mind, not 
only these inward insufficiencies, but real outward 
difficulties do in fact exist — though the secret of 
Israel's plight is in herself, not in her surroundings. 
The only enemies man need really fear are the men 
of his own house, the perversities of his own heart, 
the impositions of his own mind, the lusts of his 
own soul. Nevertheless these external difficulties, 
so-called, loom up before his anxious eyes. 

Christianity is altogether ^Visionary" from every 
human point of view. It proposes ^^practical" im- 
possibilities, that seem little short of delirious 
dreams. It publicly announces the most preposter- 
ous purposes. Its Lord performed miracles that 
filled men with mute amazement, or sent them forth 
with scoffing and derisive ridicule; how shall it be 
with the miracles to which its Lord refers when He 

38 



says to His disciples, ^^and greater works than these 
shall ye do, because I go unto my Father"? 

''Ye must be born again," it says to Nicodemus, 
the distinguished exponent of theological Dogma- 
tism, most learned in the law, a member of the illus- 
trious Sanhedrim, supreme court of the Jews, an 
associate of one to whom Festus once said, 'Taul, 
thou art beside thyself; much learning doth make 
thee mad." And Nicodemus marvels: ''How can 
these things be? Can a man be born when he is 
old? Can he enter a second time into his mother's 
womb, and be born?" He was dominated by the 
same absurd Materialism that dominates men's 
minds today. His conception of man was a certain 
fortuitous combination of meat and bones. So 
Christianity says to him, "Art thou a master in 
Israel, and knowest not these things? Except a man 
be born of water and of the spirit, he cannot enter 
into the kingdom of God. That which is born of 
the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the 
Spirit is spirit. For God so loved the world that 
he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever be- 
lieveth in him should not perish, but have ever- 
lasting life." — But "how can these things be?" 

To the woman of Samaria (now "the Jews have 
no dealings with the Samaritans"; certainly not. 
There is no neighborliness outside of Jesus Christ. 
But Christianity deals with this Samaritan woman, 
even at Jacob's well, openly and without reserve — 
it is no respecter of persons , race, or place, of class, 
creed, clime, or condition — a law of life never heard 
of until Christianity brought it to light) — it says to 

39 



this adulterous woman, the offspring of racial Ostra- 
cism and bigotry: ''Whosoever drinketh of this 
water shall thirst again; but whosoever drinketh of 
the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; 
but the water that I shall give him shall be in him 
a well of water springing up into everlasting life." 
And the carping incredulity of the world still asks 
the question that this astonished woman asked: 
''Sir, thou hast nothing to draw with, and the well is 
deep: from whence then hast thou that living water? 
Art thou greater than our father Jacob, which gave 
us the well?" In her mind, too, was a gross Mate- 
rialism in the ascendant; there are thirsts and satis- 
factions it has never dreamed of in its philosophy. 
The only water she could think of was dipped out 
of a hole in the ground with a clay pot baked in a 
furnace. So the Divine Son of Galilean obscurity, 
standing by that very deep well, having nothing 
visible, nothing tangible, to draw with, an "imprac- 
tical idealist," offers her and all men the water of 
life, the water of eternal satisfaction! — Yea, verily, 
"how can these things be?" 

"Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise 
it up," it says to a Sadducean Materialism that 
scoffs at the resurrection of the dead, and offers 
nothing to the world but violence, destruction and 
death, the social and spiritual decomposition with 
which the world is cursed. Materialistic philosophy 
is the most powerful of solvents, but it lacks the 
principle of organic life. It can resolve, but it can- 
not resurrect. It can re-duce, but it cannot pro-duce. 
It can destroy, but it cannot deliver. It can criticise, 
but it has never been known to create. 

40 



Christianity promises deliverance to the captive, 
the recovering of sight to the blind, liberty to the 
bruised, healing to the brokenhearted, and the gos- 
pel of joy to the poor. The leper, it says, must be 
restored, the palsied man made strong, the demoniac 
redeemed, the frontiers of neighborliness removed, 
racial exclusiveness and a bigoted Nationalism de- 
stroyed, social and industrial classifications dis- 
solved, enemies forgiven, and the Gospel preached to 
every creature even unto the end of the earth, the 
very term ^ ^foreign" relegated to the scrapheap of a 
Pagan past; not by the brutal ''mighf of Material- 
ism, not by the perverted ''power'' of political pull, 
not by the devilish deceits of diplomacy, not by the 
bludgeoned police powers of civil law, but ''by my 
Spirit, saith the Lord.'' 

These are some of the presumptuous ambitions of 
Christianity; and ^'how can these things be?" It is 
no wonder that the children of God, so human, so 
frail and faulty, are sometimes filled with doubt and 
dismay. 

The Menace of Materialism 

Here, too, is the ever active, occasionally open, 
but generally insidious opposition of an infidel 
world, possessed of a conscienceless Commercialism, 
dominated by Mammon, a base. Godless Material- 
ism, malignant, mean, mercenary, wdthout senti- 
ment, callous, biting the hand that feeds it, snarling, 
snapping, brutal, debauched, always deriding and 
seeking to destroy the institutions of righteousness. 

Ah, yes; the saints have met it in a thousand 
arenas, are meeting it every day in its beastly colos- 

41 



seums. They know its ruthless Antagonism, how 
numerous and mighty, how rude and persistent, how 
subtle and sinister, how deceitful and merciless. 
They know it well. It has insolently slapped them 
in the face at every crossing, foully desecrated their 
sacred altars, pastured its fat cattle in the very Sanc- 
tuary of their God, turned loose its swill-fed swine 
into the hallowed enclosures of their Day of Wor- 
ship, stung them with the venom of sarcasm, tor- 
tured and tormented them, maddened them with 
mockery, and crucified their Lord with thieves. — ■ 
And it is doing it yet; its character and disposition 
have not changed in the slightest respect in six thou- 
sand years; it has not evoluted an inch. 

^'Wherever God erects a house of prayer 
The Devil always builds an altar there" — 

and he deceitfully names it ^^The Truth." 

But Christianity says there shall not be left one 
stone upon another to tell the tale of the arrogant, 
besotted majesty of this brazen Materialism that 
dares challenge the hosts of the Most High, 

Meanwhile, however, must yonder mountain of 
malice be removed and tossed into the unf athomed 
depths of the sea. These swaggering giants of Ag- 
nosticism, so certain in the knowledge of what they 
know is ^'unknowable," must be met and disarmed. 
This wilderness of infidelity must be made the 
King's highway to Canaan. This deadly desert of 
indifference must be converted into a blossoming 
garden of life. That highland castle of political 
corruption must be stormed and hurled into the 
abyss beneath. This pestilence-breeding bog of 

42 



Belial must be healed of its miasma and filled in. 
This ravaging plague of destructive Criticism must 
be checked. This haughty hill of hilarious disre- 
gard for the most sacred institutions of life — I will 
tunnel it I This deep, dark chasm of doubt — I will 
swing a bridge across it ! This stormy ocean of uni- 
versal strife — I will flash the Gospel through its 
very depths and make its tumultuous bosom bear on 
to glory! 

The Valley of Achor must be transformed into a 
door of hope. The wrath of man must be trans- 
posed by gracious modulations into paeans of per- 
petual praise. The night of despair must be shot 
through with the inspiring radiance of the Sun of 
Righteousness. Forgotten Fatherhood must he re- 
stored to the consciousness of prodigal men. 
Crushed brotherhood must be lifted up to the pin- 
nacle of humane consideration and regard. Alien- 
ated man must again be brought back and bound to 
God and his fellow man by ties that naught can 
sever. The arbitrary geographical boundaries of 
benevolence and beneficence must be obliterated. 
The boasting grave must surrender its victory. And 
the w^hole wide world must be redeemed for the Lord 
of life and liberty. 

A Stupendous Program 
What an astounding program to set before a peo- 
ple, however numerous, prosperous, completely 
equipped and fortified, efficient, cultured and 
mighty ! But here is a people neither numerous nor 
mighty, without political standing or social pres- 
tige, lost in an inauspicious desert, rescued only re- 

43 



cently from centuries of slavery and degradation, 
without financial credit, homeless, illiterate, unshel- 
tered and friendless, having no allies, surrounded on 
every side by the most potential and bitter adver- 
saries ! Who among them may possibly be equal to 
such exploits ? No wonder they sometimes stop and 
stagger under the cumbrous weight of such a 
program. 

The Alexanders y Caesars and Napoleons of hu- 
man history have had their wild dreams of conquest, 
but none as wild as this; for they were surrounded 
by conditions and commanded forces that from every 
human point of view seemed to lend substance and 
warrant to delirious schemes of universal domina- 
tion. For four long years the aroused and trembling 
nations of the earth were not so sure but that the 
presumptuous purposes of ^^Kaiserism" would pre- 
vail; but these were backed by a population one hun- 
dred million strong, comprising the best organized 
and most efficient nation the world has thus far 
knowTi, powerful beyond compare as far as intel- 
lectual and material resources and preparedness 
were concerned. 

But, alas, poor Israel! — knowTi to the world as a 
nation of almost infinite insufficiency, without posi- 
tion or experience, and certainly possessed of a most 
excellent and ^impractical" idealism! Even its 
own illustrious and stout-hearted leaders are com- 
pelled to confess its outstanding incapabilities and 
to report concerning its enemies that ^Hhe people be 
strong that dwell in the land, and the cities are 
walled, and very great." 

44 



Meanwhile an alien world, Satanically hostile to 
God, madly jealous of His power, with insane pas- 
sion seeking to usurp His throne — with its low- 
browed ignorance and degraded superstition, its 
high-browed philosophy and false science, its arro- 
gance and pride, its haughty heresies and insidious 
lust of temporal power — gathers itself together in 
Godless alliances for new assaults upon the citadel 
of justice and righteousness, the spiritual Kingdom 
of Jesus Christ. 

It thrusts its foul fists against the sacred Scrip- 
tares; or, with more sinister design, sets out to un- 
dermine their credibility and effectual power; and 
where neither of these avail it introduces cunningly- 
devised substitutes that pretend to interpret the 
Scriptures, sometimes with an autocratic assumption 
of infallibility. It derides the church and seeks to 
bring her gracious institutions into disrepute, though 
always following in her path, just as sutlers, scaven- 
gers and rats follow on the heels of a victorious 
army. Its cowardly commerce follows a flag, and 
the flag stealthily follows the Christian missionary 
— who then becomes the target of its abusive, men- 
dacious Criticism, while it proceeds to erect a Board 
of Trade upon the foundations of truth laid by him, 
and to destroy what he created. 

Fettered and bound as the world is by sinful 
prejudice, let the alien world nevertheless judge its 
own character and Godless disposition by this alone 
— never in the history of the human race has it been 
knowm to go out into a savage wilderness and to 
create there a civilization. It has not the power to 

45 



create. It has not the courage to create. It has not 
the disposition to create. Its only mission is to de- 
vour and destroy. It has been violently pursuing 
this mission for six thousand years. It is pursuing 
it today. It is pursuing it in America. The Pil- 
grim Fathers came into this continent when it was a 
wilderness; they came in the zeal of the Spirit of 
God, with their Bibles under their arms, and with 
prayer; and one of the first things they did was to 
erect houses of Christian worship, and then to build 
school houses. The result was the American repub- 
lic, civil and religious liberty, education, and all 
the blessings and opportunities of free and abundant 
life. Then the alien world began to crowd these 
shores, an ever-increasing horde of bubonic rats, 
to devour and destroy, to find fault and to pull down 
the whole structure erected by Christian enterprise. 

Why did they not go elsewhere and start some- 
thing of their own? Or, having come, if they do not 
like what they have found here, why do they not go 
out, even now, into some equally remote wilderness, 
as did the Pilgrim Fathers, and start something to 
their own liking — this land would be happy indeed 
to have them go. Why do they linger in such a land 
as this ? — The answer has already been given — their 
mission is to destroy; lust has eaten out their creative 
power. 

They seize the Christian Day of Worship, the his- 
toric underpinning of American institutions, set up 
by our forefathers, approved by the government it- 
self, protected by civil law — they seize the Day, and 
at once proceed to destroy it with licentious secu- 

46 



larity — even as swine trample upon pearls that may 
be cast before them, and forthwith turn upon and 
rend the profligate hand that may have thus dis- 
pensed its rich possessions. With all too boisterous 
praise they extol the virtues of the Christian scheme 
of public instruction, and then go forth to deny its 
origin, to betray it into the hands of antagonistic 
Godlessness, to prostitute it to its own nefarious ag- 
grandizement, to utterly debauch it by venomous 
inoculations surreptitiously administered. They 
desecrate its sacred places and occasions with the 
fraudulent and sensuous exhibitions of a pompous, 
gold-laced Materialism, steal the very livery of 
Heaven to serve the Devil in, commercialize its con- 
secrated vessels, make of its gracious cross ^'Ne- 
hushtan," a brazen talisman, the idolatrous symbol 
of a gilded Machiavellianism, slay its children with 
the sword of lustful avarice, characterize sacrifice as 
the fool's-cap of a supercillious Fanaticism, and 
mock at the resurrection of the dead. 

We as greatly fear the Assyrian sneer as Egypt's 
battle-axe. And Israel's doubt, her halting Skepti- 
cism, should not be thoughtlessly assailed. Human 
as she is, keenly conscious of her personal insuffi- 
ciency, mindful of the immensity of the task to which 
God has set her hand, she not unnaturally quails 
before that task. She wonders how these things 
can be, how these incapabilities can be made poten- 
tial, how these oppositions possibly can be unhorsed, 
how these barriers can be reduced, how these amaz- 
ing missions can be maintained, how these sweeping 

47 



promises can be fulfilled and these pretentious pur- 
poses crowned with successful conquest. 

The Recovery of Paradise 
In view of all of which conditions and circum- 
stances, ^Svhen the Son of Man cometh shall he find 
faith on the earth?" Not much; certainly not if He 
were to come today. For faith went out when the 
Devil of infidelity came in and Paradise was dis- 
placed by strife and revolution, by division, discord 
and death; because of which, and at which time, 
the Garden of Eden, with its Divine grace and per- 
fect peace, disappeared from humanity's map — 
there was no Eden after faith had fled, after grati- 
tude, confidence and Mutuality had been cast aside, 
after God had been banished — and the mountaintop 
of joyful prospect was dissolved into a valley of dry 
bones, where the insatiable beasts of the desert make 
night hideous with their savage combats. 

One of the most widely kno^vn Socialistic infidels 
in this country, at the outset of the late war, issued 
what he called ^'An Utimatum Against War." As a 
matter of course it was superficial and inconsistent 
throughout. If he meant what he tried to say, how- 
ever, why did not he himself start out by first ac- 
cepting the offers of peace made by God? He has 
been at war with God, and consequently with him- 
self and his fellow men, all his life — fighting God, 
fighting his fellow men, while an evidently fierce 
tumult has been proceeding in his own alienated 
soul. The ^^war" he opposed, terrible as it was, 
was only an outlying, incidental skirmish ; or rather 
the frightful flash of the real conflict. The main 

48 



issue is not between man and man, hut between man 
and his Maker, Let that issue be settled first; for 
then, and then only, will men no longer make war 
upon each other. 

As a matter of fact the recent so-called ^'war" was 
in no true sense war at all, but only war's eruption. 
The disease is deep-seated, not superficial. Essen- 
tial war is a state of mind, not a sanguinary en- 
counter. It is an inward condition, not an outward 
conflict. And that condition or state of mind pri- 
marily concerns the Almighty, not some man, or 
men, or nation. 

And is the war now over because this particular 
conflict, encounter, or eruption has passed? Is the 
fire now out because the distant volcano has sub- 
sided? Has the fundamental character and condi- 
tion of the earth been changed in the least respect 
because the local, superficial mountain no longer 
spouts sulphurous flame and molten streams of de- 
struction? Will watching over it with a mailed fist 
prevent another eruption? Will a league to tn- force 
peace put an end to it, when force was the very thing 
that caused it? Will a vast international bucket 
brigade be sufficient to keep the smoldering flame 
from bursting forth again? Has the yawning crater 
been effectually filled in with a somewhat more 
elaborate scrap of paper? Can the frightful vent 
be successfully stoppered by some Socialistic cork 
driven into it with the ostentation of a multitude of 
confused, vengeful and tumultuous words? — O, the 
childish vanity of a wicked world at war with God! 

49 



And now that it is presumably all over, having 
haughtily attempted to take justice and vengeance 
out of the hand of Him in whose hand only they 
are not a sinister source of injustice and destruction 
— now let America sit down and count the cost: 
69,000 of her best young men dead on the battle- 
fields of France ; a hundred thousand more maimed 
for life; a twenty-five billion dollar debt that will 
be paid off largely out of the pilfered pockets of the 
poor by profiteering prices on the necessaries of life, 
and merciless legalized taxation imposed on liberty 
and peace; the world seething with restlessness and 
bitter rebellion; the scattered flame bursting out in 
hundreds of places instead of but one ; China appar- 
ently outraged; nations and races deliberately 
crushed in order to be rid of them as competitors; 
statesmanship an object of jest to the exploited 
masses; respect for law and order reduced tenfold; 
human life cheapened; the game of grab and graft 
glorified; the Christian Day of Worship trans- 
formed more fully into a day of high carnival, and 
all other sacred institutions of Godliness desecrated 
in the same degree; legalized robbery rampant; the 
ancient crime called Militarism (the Thing the 
world has just hypocritically fought) universally 
dominant; a policeman's club and a constable's sum- 
mons the court of last resort, the supreme accom- 
plishment of Twentieth Century civilization; the 
commercialized and prostituted public press seeking 
to create, at any cost to the public it pretends to 
represent, any new dissension, or upheaval, or secu- 
larity that may furnish ^^stuff" for its licentious col- 

50 



umns, and increase its circulation — it gloats over 
any scandal, sacrilege, or shambles that makes 
'^news"; and Paradise lost is swept farther out to 
sea on a veritable tidal wave of Godlessness. 

The only possible Way in which Paradise may be 
restored to the children of men is Mutuality; the 
substance of Mutuality is Brotherhood; and the liv- 
ing soul of Brotherhood is Fatherhood, from which 
alone can Brotherhood and Mutuality spring to life. 
The cleansing, amalgamating ''flux'' in the composi- 
tion of Mutuality and Brotherhood is the love of 
God manifested in the shed blood of Jesus Christy 
His Son, very God of very God, man's '^elder 
brother," received through faith. His blood 
^'cleanseth us from all sin" — that is, from the cor- 
rosive, schismatic, 6^6-composing elements in the 
crucible of human life. It is the blood of Jesus 
Christ that makes the fusion of these opposing ele- 
ments possible. It is appropriating faith in His 
blood that will ^ ^destroy the works of the Devil," 
which works are summed up in '^alienation" and 
^^decomposition"; without which faith the dis- 
cordant, antagonistic, heterogeneous elements of 
human society will never be assimilated or harmon- 
ized, and social unity, concord and homogeneity will 
continue to be a hectic hallucination, the delirium 
tremens of a race besotted with sin. 

The disaffected human race cannot realize the 
blessings of life, liberty and peace until it is rein- 
corporated into the life of God; and it cannot be 
reincorporated into His life except by the life of the 
Son of God laid down on Calvary. Only this fact 

51 



remains to be stated, to wit: the so-called ^^flux" 
has an essential affinity for all the warring elements 
in the crucible, is in all points save one just like 
them all, lacks only the destructive factor of Schism 
and discord, is exactly suited to the need of each of 
these hostile and incorrigible elements, gives itself 
up for them all, that they all may be one in it; and 
yet the ^^flux" is essentially different from them all, 
foreign to them all, introduced, given, added, freely, 
from without, from above, enters into their body, 
through the hand of wisdom, grace and faith, be- 
comes incorporated with them, becomes ^^manifest" 
in their body, and thus redeems them from enmity 
and decomposition, purges out the impurities, so that 
there comes forth out of that crucible the same thing, 
yet a wholly different thing, a new creation, a thing 
born again, and like it — for ^^as many as received 
him, to them gave he power to become the sons of 
God." 

In like manner ^'in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes 
were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ. 
For He is our peace, who hath made both one, and 
hath broken down the middle wall of partition be- 
tween us; having abolished in his flesh the enmity, 
even the law of commandments contained in ordi- 
nances; for to make in himself of twain one new 
man, so making peace; and that he might reconcile 
both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain 
the enmity thereby; and come and preached peace 
to vou which were afar off, and to them that were 
nigh." 

52 



Meanwhile in every other ''Melting Pof there is 
''boil and bubble, toil and trouble'' ; and the war 
goes on, without interruption — amalgamation fails 
utterly, brotherhood is a mere hubbub, federation 
is a fiction, and unity is a plausible lie, visible to 
the naked eye, without the use of microscope, or the 
processes of analytical chemistry — it is what the 
metallurgist calls a ''faked mix/' 

The Restoration of Partnership 

Something is fundamentally wrong in the so- 
called ''life" of the home; life "so-called" because 
there is no life in fact were there is decomposition. 
All human society knows there is something essen- 
tially wrong in the home, it does not need to be told. 
What is it? The question has called forth a thou- 
sand superficial answers. How may that wrong be 
remedied? This question, in turn, has brought out 
a thousand inappropriate and ineft'ectual cures. 

There is but one thing wrong in the home "life" 
of modern society, and it is this: partisanship has 
displaced partnership ; the man has ceased to be the 
true "head" of the home and has become the 
woman's landlord, or dictator — or, on the other 
hand, her escort, fiscal agent, aide-de-camp, prop- 
erty man, or what not; the woman has ceased to be 
his "helpmeet" and has become to him a menial, 
his hired servant, possibly his legalized paramour — 
or, on the other hand, his quartermaster-general, his 
censor, his aggressive rival for social, political, pro- 
fessional and commercial honors and advantages; 
competition has supplanted communion; the clash- 
ing lust of empire and publicity has possessed them 

63 



both; and Mutuality has given way to schismatic 
Materialism — God has been let out! The heart of 
the home has been crucified on a cross of disinte- 
grating, corrosive Carnalism — and there has re- 
sulted this two-headed monstrosity. 

The unhappiest day in the history of the Amer- 
ican nation will be the day when that delirious 
heresy called '^ Equal Suffrage" becomes a vote — the 
most superficial nonsense and destructive hallucina- 
tion a sin-crazed w^orld has yet produced, propa- 
gated by infidel women, fostered by lewd, self-seek- 
ing politicians in church and state, in defiance of 
truth, W'ith insolent disregard of God's Word, and 
striking viciously at the very fundamentals of all 
that is sacred in the home and beneficial to human 
society. The lure is as ^Svild" as the misguided, 
God-insulting, unsexed females who are engaged in 
promoting it, who have already begun to refuse to 
assume their husbands' names, and to compel these 
effeminated, prostituted men to introduce them as 
'^My wife. Miss So-and-so." Thus Feminism has 
already become the livid murderer of unborn babes, 
the fierce cancer-spot of society, and is rapidly con- 
verting the home into a legalized house of ill-fame. 

^^Equal Suffrage," on the very face of it, is a 
painted and powdered falsehood, another insidious 
fiction, the offspring of mental perversity, moral 
deterioration, and social putridity. 

When is a rose ^^equal" to the hardy bush on 
which it thrives, and from which it becomes preg- 
nant with life, fragrant with loveliness? Why 
should it insanely desire to become '^equal" to that 

54 



of which it is the fairest flower, in mutual joy and 
pride? No sane soul can understand what it means 
by this wild cry for '^equality." Does it mean that 
the rose garden shall be all bush and no bloom? 
In fact it cannot possible mean anything else; with 
this result: the flower will fade and fall, and the 
bush run wild, bereft of beauty, cumbering the 
ground. 

Shall they henceforth occupy the same place and 
perform the same functions, instead of two essen- 
tially distinct places functioning with each other in 
the perfect harmony of a ^^differential"? Shall the 
'' count er-p^LVt^^ cease to be joined to the other part 
in the essential fitness of glad and effective service? 
Shall their God-appointed ^^disposition" be disposed 
of in the sulphurous friction of incompatibility? 
^'Equality," so-called, is simply the alias of incom- 
patibility. 

Shall genuine Mutuality give way to spurious 
'^equality" — the most divinely gracious fact in hu- 
man society be set aside by the most heinous fiction 
human society has faced since it fell from grace 
into Godless discord? 

Divorce existed long before it was legalized. 
Separation existed long before the court formally 
granted it. Decomposition set in long before the 
public burial of the marriage bond. And the only 
way back to the partnership of Paradise is in and 
through Jesus Christ. He is the only medium of 
Mutuality. He, and He only, is the flux of com- 
munion. He is the amalgamating factor in a social 
composition that no man can dissolve, for it is acid- 

55 



proof. In Him ''the ushole body (the body made 
lihole again) fitly joined together and compacted 
by that which every joint supplieth, according to 
the effectual working in the measure of every part, 
maketh increase of the body unto the edifying of 
itself in love/' 

There is something fundamentally T\Tong with the 
''master minds'* of the world. The whole civilized 
Vy'orld knows it, from the least unto the greatest, 
from Dan to Beersheba. What is it? and what is its 
remedy? They are constantly saying things that 
make even a half-baked school-boy laugh in child- 
ish scorn. They are every day doing things that 
are incomprehensible in their shortsightedness and 
mediocrity. The most distinguished scientists seem 
to spend most of their time revising their o\^TL views 
and contradicting each other. The most learned 
philosophers agree on nothing essential. The great 
statesmen of the world get together and build boast- 
ful Babels notable for nothing but confusion. 
Astute senators, members of "the most distinguished 
deliberative body in the world/' today announce 
some new political nostrum that is going to trans- 
form national and international life, and tomorrow 
hasten to countermand the prescription and to pre- 
scribe something quite the reverse in every ingredi- 
ent of it vdt\i the same pompous Dogmatism. What 
is the matter? Their minds are besotted with the 
same corrupt Materialism, that long since dissolved 
partnership with God, and has set aside the only 
factor under Heaven whereby they must be saved — 

56 



saved from the absurdities of Schism, saved from 
sin! 

To redeem the world, the home, these ^'master 
minds,'' that all men through Jesus Christ may be 
saved — to recover Paradise: this is the stupendous 
program set before the children of God. — In the 
multitude of thy tender mercies, O God, be gracious 
to Thy people if they sometimes falter and fall! 

The Destruction of the Golden Calf 

The writer does not recall having heard a sermon 
in twenty-five years that has failed to make certain 
obsequious salaams to ^'The Golden Calf," to toss 
bouquets to Materialism, or to pat the dollar-chaser 
on the back. During the same period he does not 
recall reading a religious periodical that has not 
done precisely the same thing. To the fiddling of 
in-fidelity the pew has danced off to the flesh pots 
of perverted appetite, and the pulpit has played the 
accompaniment, has applauded its pursuit of mate- 
rial property and power. Its choice apparently 
having lain between this and ''the brow of the hill," 
it has preferred to ''play safe." As certainly as the 
members of the congregation "were filled with 
wrath," when Jesus preached in the synagogue at 
Nazareth, "and rose up, and thrust him out of the 
city, and led him unto the brow of the hill, whereon 
the city was built, that they might cast him down 
headlong," so would it fare with the preacher today 
who dared to preach the whole truth in its naked 
simplicity and fullness of power. The religious 
periodical would go into bankruptcy in six months 



that refused to flatter the Materialism that supplies 
it with '^the sinews of war" — ^Var" is Hell! 

Nor is it hard for the said preacher or editor to 
find excuse and warrant for such idolatrous bond- 
age. All he need do is summon to the witness-stand 
the Scriptures of the ancient Judaism (the Judaism 
of polygamy, fire and sword) in order to prove, 
beyond peradventure, that material prosperity is a 
criterion of the special consideration and Divine 
favor of Almighty God. And he is doing it; ten 
thousand times on every Day of Worship, unnum- 
bered times throughout all the other Lord's Days of 
the week. ^^All these things shall be added unto 
you," he says. But when it comes to showing what 
things Christ meant when He used these words, and 
when, and how, and where, he dodges. ^^O, Baal, 
hear us!" he cries; '^the mortgage must be reduced, 
interest payments must be met, salaries are unpaid, 
the coal bill is overdue, the church kitchen needs 
repairs, and a new sewer pipe must be laid ; so please 
come over with the coin." And Baal boasts of his 
strangle-hold on the Christian church, while the im- 
poverished, unshepherded masses stand aloof and 
sneer in bitter derision. 

The true sources of vital power are not in the 
possession of the Money Devil of Materialism. The 
real power of Christian service lies in courage, and 
the essence of true courage is found only in fidelity 
to truth, not in popular assemblies and not in the 
checkbook of Dives. It is found in self-effacement, 
not in self-assertion; in repose, not in action; in 
patience, not in impetuosity; in trusting God, not in 

58 



tempting Him, or doubtingly trying Him out; in 
using the means of His appointment, not the ways 
and means of materialistic Godlessness, not the cur- 
rent coinage of ^^the kingdoms of this world." 

''If thou art a son of God," the Devil says, ''as- 
sert thyself, let the world have some visible sign and 
token of thy power with God; command that these 
stones be made bread; thou art weary and hungry; 
arise, speak the word, and eat." The Devil is too 
cunning and insidious to openly tempt the Christian 
from the path of service, so he tempts him in the 
path of service. He offers a convenient, urgent, 
plausible and apparently proper means of helping 
the Christian on in his Godly mission — but the 
means offered is selfish, material and ruinous. Yet 
the Christian has everywhere fallen for it! His 
only way of escape in that hour of wilderness 
temptation lies, not in self-assertion, but in self- 
denial, and above all in fidelity to truth — ''It is 
written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by 
every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of 
God." 

Then the Devil comes with another materialistic 
lure, with the same plausible appeal to self-asser- 
tion ("my individuality," as the Suffragist says): 
"If thou be a child of God, demonstrate it before 
these physical eyes; assert thyself; try God out; 
put Him to the test; cast thyself down from this 
pinnacle of His temple; think how sensational it 
would be; it would prove Him and the integrity of 
His Word before the world; it would also be the 
most convincing proof of thy sonship; cast thyself 

69 



down — is it not thy Father's house?" The tempta- 
tion, again, is in God's service, and on a high-point 
of God's house; it is not from that service, or away 
from that house. O, how sinister! And the Chris- 
tian falls for it, thinks God will sustain such self- 
assertion, accept such materialistic challenges — and 
dashes his foot against a stone ! Or, if he does not, 
he once more finds a refuge in self-effacement and 
fidelity to truth: ''It is written, Thou shalt not tempt 
the Lord thy God." 

The Re-establishment of Truth 

And now for the third and supreme test. The 
Devil says: ''Thou hast a great and good mission 
to perform, involving God's glory and man's salva- 
tion ; I will help thee, if thou wilt but efface thyself, 
humble thyself, fall down and worship me; he that 
humbleth himself shall be exalted; so don't be fool- 
ish about it; it is the opportunity of a lifetime, thy 
last and best chance; here are all the kingdoms of 
the world and the glory of them; all shall be thine 
without asking; without them thou wilt fail; with 
them, think what thou canst accomplish, and how 
much more quickly; is not this thy Father's world, 
and have not these powers been ordained of God 
for this very purpose? are they not His 'ministering 
servants'? Appropriate them; apply them to the 
furtherance of thy gracious plans; talk is cheap, 
but these material things are a real means of grace, 
and thou art but a poor carpenter's son. Who will 
pay the bill of this great adventure of thine? These 
kingdoms are exceedingly rich and mighty. Do not 

60 



love them, but use them. Time is short, the world is 
dying — and does not the end justify the means? 
Come on, be clever, be a good sport, be a good 
'mixer,' and don't be a prude; fall down and wor- 
ship — and all these essential things shall be added 
unto you." — O God; if Jesus had fallen for this He 
would have been no more than other men. Have 
not they all fallen for this? Not always with the 
deliberate intention of dishonoring or hindering 
Thee; yet often because they have thought them- 
selves wiser than Thou art and have really meant 
to help and honor Thee. — The temptation is in the 
way, not away from it. And, lo, it is to self-efface- 
ment this time, to the sacrifice of self ("i^Xl down 
and worship me") — but to the same disastrous Ma- 
terialism! ''It is written'' was Christ's defence; 
fidelity to truth is the Christian's- — he has no other. 
Truth is sufficient, with true faith. The Sword of 
the Spirit never fails; the kingdoms of this world 
do, and their glory departs, and their riches take 
wings and fly away. Money has never won a war — 
it has never won anything worth the winning, '^Get 
thee hence, Satan"; and that which is thine, take it 
with thee to thine own place in Hell! — Then, and 
not till then, do '^angels come and minister unto" 
the sons of God. 

''It is written'' is the panacea for all ills, the em- 
bodiment of Divine power, the only ways and means 
of world conquest. And is the pulpit so hard-driven 
for subjects that it must consult the ''Current 
Events" column of the newspaper to see what is the 
question of the day? The question of the day has 

61 



not changed one iota since sin took possession of 
the human heart; the question of the day is the ques- 
tion of every day from that fateful hour to this: 
How can a man be forgiven, a broken heart be 
healed, a man brought back to God? This ques- 
tion is answered in the Lord's house, and in the 
Lord's house only; and the answer is unique. The 
message of the Lord's house must he unique; it 
must deal with God, and blood, and sin, and par- 
don, and holiness, and destiny; it must be a great 
message of reconciliation and atonement, of love 
and liberty, of Divine justice and righteousness. 
And if man comes to his Father's house at all, if 
his coming shall be of some real, permanent value, 
it is not to hear of revolutions but of revelations; 
not to hear the latest news from the kingdoms of 
this world, but the good news from the Kingdom of 
Heaven; not to hear of new theologies, but of the 
old salvation by the blood of the cross; not to hear 
of trifling socialisms, conceited rationalisms, indus- 
trial readjustments, vain schemes of political reor- 
ganization, the latest literary novelties and scientific 
discoveries, cellar whitewashing, drain enlarge- 
ments, catch-penny amusements, and other parish 
happenings and business — but because he has come 
to realize that his soul is perishing with hunger, 
and because he has been told that in his Father's 
house there is ^^bread enough and to spare." 

The message of the pulpit must he one that the 
world cannot hear elsewhere, in the same auspicious 
setting, sense and degree. When the pulpit comes 
into competition with the lecture platform, lyceum 

62 



and political ^^stump," when God's house comes 
into competition with the concert hall, place of 
amusement and prostituted public press, its race has 
been run, its place has been lost, its effectual power 
has been effectually supplanted by a mess of pot- 
tage. 

To throw off the shackles of ^^The Golden Calf," 
to free themselves from the str angle-hold of ^'The 
Almighty Dollar," to restore the God-appointed 
means of grace, to serve God and ''him only" — this 
is Israel's plight, this is the stupendous program set 
before the children of God. — How can these things 
be? 



II. GOD'S PURPOSE 

But Christianity looks hopefully beyond the vi- 
cissitudes of the present, the doubts and fears and 
failures that fill its most devoted ranks, the mis- 
takes of the past, and the obstacles of the future. It 
rises majestically above the difficulties that face it, 
stands stronger than the eternal hills in the midst 
of deserts that seem ever ready to swallow it up, 
moves constantly forward against the multitudi- 
nous and mighty forces that oppose it, and presses 
the battle of beneficence even to the golden gates of 
glorious achievement. 

It knows not defeat. It has never been taught to 
''beat a retreat." It has no part in ultimate failure. 
For God is in it. God is back of it. God is on both 
sides of it. God is above it. His everlasting arms 
are underneath it. And He leads it on to the con- 

63 



summation of the Kingdom of His eternal Son. It 
is essentially triumphant, as truth is. It boldly de- 
clares that ^^his kingdom is an everlasting kingdom," 
that ^'he shall have dominion from sea to sea, and 
from the river mito the ends of the earth," and that 
they that be wise in their loyalty to truth ^ 'shall 
shine as the brightness of the firmament, and they 
that turn many to righteousness as the stars forever 
and ever." 

Nor is man's faltering faith in the staying power 
of God's triumphant purpose permitted to struggle 
on unhelped. On the contrary it is abundantly con- 
firmed by the testimony of history, philosophy and 
revelation. 



1 . The Testimony of History 

Christianity had its historic beginnings in an in- 
significant, obscure, worked-out land — a land sub- 
dued and devastated by triumphant, ruthless, im- 
perious Paganism; among a people de-nationalized, 
impoverished, scattered and universally scorned. 
The Jew was, and is, the most generally despised 
race the world has ever known. 

It was cradled in the miserable environment of 
an oriental stable. It was exiled into Egypt while 
still in its swaddling clothes, a trembling fugitive 
from the savage sword of a degenerate king. Its 
youth was spent amidst the shavings and dust of a 
Nazarene carpenter-shop, where it earned a scanty 
livelihood by laborious toil. 

In early manhood we find it a wanderer in the 
earth, homeless and friendless, except for a few, 

64 



common, illiterate, fisher-folk disciples, which it 
gathered up in the coasts of Galilee. 

It was without honor even among its own kith 
and kin, persecuted by the Judaism from which it 
sprang, the jest of classic Greek and the laughing- 
stock of imperious Roman. 

It sweat great drops of blood in the Garden of 
Gethsemane, and was taken at the garden gate with 
swords and staves, like a common thief. Thence it 
was rushed without ceremony into judgment, mock- 
ery and insult, ignominiously crucified with con- 
demned criminals, and buried in a borrowed tomb. 

Regarded as the beginnings of a universal king- 
dom, these circumstances were more than humble; 
they were nothing short of preposterous. A ^ ^little 
leaven hid'' in the three vast measures of the human 
race, the numerous posterity of Shem, Ham and 
Japhet, this farce of a kingdom came, for a cer- 
tainty, ^^without observation." A tiny mustard seed, 
^Svhich indeed is the least of all seeds," this plant- 
ing, surely enough, was a '^fool's errand." A re- 
mote spring threading its silvery way down the 
rough and mighty mountainside of human affairs, 
silent and unseen, this struggling stream gave prom- 
ise of nothing but rapid consumption by the massive 
material elements amid which it worked its tortuous 
way. A fleck of floating fleece far down on the dis- 
tant horizon of the world's wild life, naught but a 
prophet's vision could divine for it anything but 
speedy dissipation, or to be blown out to sea. 

Furthermore, we should remember that this insti- 
tution was not wanted. It was not an ingenious 

65 



invention that would save men time, trouble and 
money, that would bring them financial wealth, so- 
cial prestige, or political power. Therefore it was 
not wanted. It promised no man ^'acres of dia- 
monds,'' or any other material, sordid emoluments. 
Therefore it was not wanted. It lured no man with 
the assurance of sensuous pleasure, self-indulgence, 
fame and flattery. Therefore it was not wanted. 
Its successful advance would not be noteworthy had 
all men been clamoring for it. They had not been 
clamoring for it. On the contrary they had been 
clamoring for the Thing to which it was altogether 
and diametrically opposed. It came unsolicited, 
and was presently treated as an insolent intrusion, as 
an offence to the thought and spirit of the age in 
which it came, a challenge to its brutality and lust. 

The Whole Lump Leavened 

The Pharisaical orthodoxy of the day, to which 
Jesus so frequently addressed himself, regarded it 
as ^^leaven," a most offensive thing to its shallow, 
soulless Ecclesiasticism; it declared that Christian- 
ity was a corrupting influence in the midst of Juda- 
ism, treated it as such, despised and scorned it. 
Was it not already ^ forking" in the minds and 
hearts of the people ? Were they not even now in a 
^^ferment" because of it? Bigoted devotees of im- 
leavened bread, the Jews loathed this new influence 
in their community. They passionately averred 
that it was ^'leavening" the whole nation with cor- 
ruption, and rose up in indignant opposition to it. 
It would nevertheless ' 'leaven," permeate, revolu- 

66 



tionize, ''the whole lump/' no matter how offensive 
it might seem to their perverted minds, and no mat- 
ter in what terms they might characterize it. Thus 
it was ''despised and rejected of men/' the men of 
its own house. "It's rotten/' they vulgarly ex- 
claimed; "we will have none of it." 

It certainly was "leaven" to that generation of 
perverts, to those punctillious ecclesiastics. But 
just as certainly would its influence prevail. The 
evil thing the Jew disdained would fill the earth, 
permeate human society — "the stone which the 
builders rejected, the same is become the head of 
the corner: this is the Lord's doing, and it is mar- 
velous in our eyes.'' This offensive factor of fer- 
mentation ivould in due course become universally 
popular; the tenets and customs of Judaism would 
give vuay to the ideas and ideals of Christianity. 
And it has come to pass. Leaven itself is now as 
universal in its use as is Christianity in its sway. 
Thus "the kingdom of heaven/' says Jesus, "is like 
unto leaven." /\nd the Jew hated it with a fierce 
hatred born only of religious Fanaticism; he em- 
ployed every means at his command to extermi- 
nate it. 

These same case-hardened disciples of Ism de- 
spised Christianity even as they despised "the fowls 
of the air,'' regarded them as foul pests ("yet your 
heavenly Father feedeth them," Jesus replied to 
their objections). But however they regarded them, 
even these despised creatures, in multitudinous 
flocks, would find "a nest/' and "a home" for them- 
selves, in this new religion; for this insignificant 

67 



mustard seed^ Jesus assured them, would develop 
into a great tree, and '^the birds of the air would 
come and lodge in the branches thereof," the God- 
less Gentiles whom the Jews despised, with whom 
they would have '^no dealings," and who even then 
were filling their land, from every clime and nation 
and race, building their foul nests in their door- 
yards and marts, even in the sacred altars of the 
Lord's house, defiling them, corrupting their youth, 
their creed, their historic Ceremonialism, their 
homes and synagogues; breaking into their exclu- 
sive preserves, prerogatives and privileges ; and who 
were already beginning to flock to the young rabbi 
from Nazareth. 

Thus the Jews wrathfully stigmatized the Gen- 
tiles, scorned them with a bitter scorn. But call them 
what they might, this world-religion would prevail, 
and the Gentiles would come to its light and kings to 
the brightness of its rising. ^ Who are these that fly 
as a cloud, and as doves to their windows?" God 
is no respecter of persons; and ''your heavenly 
Father feedeth them," too. But the Jew despised 
them as foul pests. And thus he hated Christianity. 
Today, however, these ''fowls of the air"are courted 
and protected, they find a home in the Lord's house; 
the ideals of Ism have had to give way before the 
truth of Christianity; and Christianity prevails, is 
likewise courted and protected. The "leaven" is a 
wholesome universal blessing, and "the birds of the 
air" are no longer pests but means of grace. But the 
Jew hated them both, and went to any extreme to de- 
stroy them utterly. 



By the time Christianity had come to full man- 
Jiood both the temporal and ecclesiastical ''powers 
that be" were hurled against it on all sides with un- 
mentionable malice. It boldly laid the axe to the 
root of the tree of universal corruption, imperial 
tyranny, social, sectarian and national bigotry. It 
publicly exposed the festering sores of society. It 
assured all men, from the Roman emperor, haughty 
ecclesiastic and cultured Greek, down to the mean- 
est wretch in the realm, that they all alike were with- 
out God in the world and aliens from the common- 
wealth of the redeemed, depraved, besotted and con- 
demned. It offered no flatteries, courted no favor, 
granted no compromises, made no concessions to 
unrighteousness, did no side-stepping, never played 
pussyfoot, bestow^ed no indulgences, threw down the 
gauntlet to the world. 

It therefore met with the fiercest Antagonism and 
persecution on every hand. Kings and princes rose 
up against it. Herod beheaded John the baptist. 
Jerusalem was in a white heat of Pharisaical indig- 
nation because of it. The Jews crucified Jesus. 
Athens and Ephesus, those self-esteeming centers of 
deluded learning, sneered and scoffed. Its disciples 
w^ere despised, hissed through the streets, tortured 
and tormented, hunted down and slain like beasts. 

Yet it went on! 

A clever craft was it that could weather such a 
bitter sea! All the censorious scholarship of the 
centuries can find but one satisfactory answer to 
the challenge of these facts — there was a Divine 
hand at the helm. Divine power was in the hold. 

69 



The TRANsroRMATioN or Society 
And how marvelous were the later results of 
Christ's teaching! Even the infidel historian Ed- 
ward Gibbon, whose magic language embellished 
everything it touched save Christianity only, whose 
imagination was dead to its moral dignity, and who 
maintained toward it a tone of jealous disparage- 
ment, was nevertheless compelled to write of it in his 
''Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" as fol- 
lows: ''While the Roman w^orld was invaded by 
open violence, or undermined by slow decay, this 
pure and humble religion quietly insinuated itself 
into the minds of men; grew up in silence and ob- 
scurity; derived new vigor from opposition; and 
finally erected the triumphal banner of the cross on 
the ruins of the Roman capital." — And it never fired 
a shot, nor drew a sword! 

It said to the world: "Silver and gold have I 
none, but such as I have give I unto thee; in the 
name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth rise up and walk." 
And it was not until the beguilements of Mammon 
seized its professors, not until the lust of earthly em- 
pire possessed them, not until the mania of Material- 
ism enslaved them, and they began to bow to the 
Beast, as they are everywhere doing today, being 
more or less helplessly bound by "The Almighty 
Dollar," that the Christian church so largely lost its 
miracle-working power. 

Meanwhile the body social began to be slowly 
but surely transformed under its gracious influence. 
The body politic underwent similar radical changes 
as the light of revealed truth was turned upon it. A 

70 



new learning appeared by virtue of its tuition. It 
cast the mighty from their seats and exalted them of 
low degree. And in due course even a case-hard- 
ened, arrogant, licentious Ecclesiasticism was 
shaken to its foundations by the influence of the 
truthful simplicity of its faithful followers. The 
classic gods were gone, the Caesars passed into his- 
tory, and despotic popes grew pale in the presence 
of purity and truth. 

And this steadily continued through all the suc- 
ceeding generations, in spite of all the apostasies of 
its people and the assaults of its adversaries, until 
the light of modern liberty and fraternity began to 
break under its exalted standard, the present-day 
^^wage-slave," so-called, being a delirious fiction 
compared wdth the ^^galley-slave'' of old Rome, or 
the roped-and-tied tenant of the feudal ages. Hu- 
man society today, imperfect as it is — imperfect only 
so far as it has obstinately refused to live the Chris- 
tian life — owes every blessing and advantage it en- 
joys (and they are legion) to the Gospel and King- 
dom of Jesus Christ. Opposed by the high and 
mighty, assailed by friend and foe, by church and 
state, tempted of the Devil, enticed by Paganism, 
assaulted by lewd men of the baser sort, ensnared 
by sophistry, taunted by scientific Cynicism, beaten 
and stoned, grossly and persistently misrepresented 
as to its origin, essential principles, purpose, means, 
methods and destiny, cast into prison and sawn 
asunder, crucified, or thrown into the arena with 
ravenous beasts, libeled and lacerated — it has gone 
on, and on! 

71 



Surely this religion is here to stay; and not only 
to stay but to press constantly forward in its vic- 
torious march until the whole world is filled with its 
benign light — the prophets of Pessimism to the con- 
trary notwithstanding. ''When the enemy comes in 
like a flood" the Lord of the Kingdom ''lifts up a 
standard against him" — the enemy simply ''kicks 
against the pricks'' of his own perversity. And the 
banner of the cross — it shall never, it shall never 
suffer loss. 

Look, ye saints; the sight is glorious: 

See the Man of Sorrows now; 
From the fight returned victorious, 

Every knee to Him shall bow; 
Crown Him! Crown Him! 

Crowns become the Victor's brow. 

Truth Triumphant 

Man can kill the body; but he cannot destroy the 
soul, Christianity is a soul — and it is immortaL 
Man may exterminate the outward form of Godli- 
ness; but he cannot dissipate its inward spirit. A 
Paul he can crucify; but the soul of Paul goes 
marching on. The preacher may pass out; but the 
principle he proclaimed will live. The malicious 
club of debauched brotherhood may strike the faith- 
ful worshipper to the ground ; but his faith survives 
to the end of time, his ideals prevail forever. 

Christianity does not seek ''the kingdoms of this 
world and the glory of them,'' They are no lure to 
it. Their so-called prestige and power it does not 
desire. It is in no sense or degree in competition 

72 



with them. Ism is; for Ism is Schism, and Schism 
is anti-Christ. But Christianity is not. Its King- 
dom is not of this world; but it sets up the Divine 
standards of spirituality — the standards of faith, 
and hope, and love, and justice — in the personal life 
of a man, a woman, a child. The flesh-pots of tem- 
poral powder never tempt it. It never says ''let us 
make a captain, and let us return into Egypt." It 
has meat that the natural man knows nothing of; 
and it craves not selfish, carnal indulgence, but only 
gracious. Divine effulgence. 

The outcome of the test to which the Devil put 
Jesus in the wilderness temptation demonstrates this 
sublime fact fully. It was the test of Materialism — 
material bread, material protection, material em- 
pire ; but fidelity to truth prevailed. In Eden, how- 
ever, man cast off fidelity to truth, he cast off obedi- 
ence, and in a precisely similar temptation he fell. 
"Ye shall be as gods," was the lying lure that ''got" 
him. He turned his back upon God and truth (God 
had made him free to do it) ; he insolently discarded 
the fact that "man shall not live by bread alone, but 
by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of 
God"; he deliberately cast himself down from the 
pinnacle of God's temple; he w^nt prospecting after 
the kingdoms of this world and the glory of them. 

And this is man's fall today. The lust of worldly 
empire prevails on every hand, with all its ruthless 
barbarity, its frightfulness and brutality. Man's 
chaplet is a dinner-pail; bread for his belly he 
craves, not truth for his soul. Like the demon-pos- 
sessed man among the tombs of Gadara, he madly 

73 



cuts himself with the stones that will not turn to 
bread at his mutinous command; and no man can 
bind him! He wilfully casts himself down head- 
long from the ambitious heights of presumption and 
disobedience, and having dashed his wayward foot 
^'against a stone" he turns and curses both the Tem- 
ple of the Lord and the Lord of the Temple. This, 
and this only, is ^^the intolerable Thing." 

Ism says that a man's value to society is deter- 
mined by his ''contribution to the production of 
material wealth'' ; in other words by the size of his 
offering to ''The Golden Calf," It placards the 
highways with ^Tearn more, Earn more" — that is, 
a man should learn more in order that he may be in 
a better position to increase his material income, 
not that he may promote his spirituality and help 
to make his fellow men more Godly, and God more 
glorious in their eyes. It scornfully assures the 
world that ^4t takes money to buy a farm," though 
money has never bought a farm, has never made a 
farm, and has never redeemed a man merely by 
making a farmer of him. This is the philosophy 
that has honeycombed the world with corrosive dis- 
content, and the corruption of a wallowing Mate- 
rialism. 

It even comes into the pulpit and openly declares 
that "money is all right, it is only the love of money 
that is the root of all evil." Therefore get money, 
it urges; and with all thy getting, get money. Pur- 
sue it ; but do not love it ! Court it ; but do not love 
it ! Marry it ; but do not love it. Have children by 
it (money is most prolific!); but do not love it! 

74 



Make all the money you can; go to it; but do not 
love it! — Where in all the Christian Scriptures is 
there the slightest warrant for any such philosophy? 
Nowhere! Let no man thumb his way hack to 
Judaism to find some warrant for such sops to Ma- 
terialism — or he may also find warrant for the pos- 
session of ''a thousand wives and concubines'' ! 
Interpretations of this sort and variety are only the 
base by-product of a Godless Commercialism; 
Christianity does not at all enter into them. 

For this reason it lives. For this reason it has 
safely passed through nineteen centuries of storm, 
strife, disloyalty and opposition. 

Wonders God Hath Wrought 

A pity it was, in those early days at Kadesh- 
barnea, that the children of Jehovah so quickly for- 
got all that had gone before in their experience as 
a nation. In the good Providence of God w^hat a 
history was theirs! It abounded in wonders of 
Divine mercy, wisdom and power. It revealed the 
gracious presence of God at every turn. From it 
they might have drawn sufficient assurance and in- 
spiration to have swept the swaggering sons of 
Anak, the carping Canaanites, the idolatrous Periz- 
zites, and every other foe, from all the rude fortifi- 
cations of their hostile infidelity in one swift ad- 
vance — and without drawing a bow or casting a 
spear. 

And what a history has Christianity ! Laid in a 
manger at the beginning, it now sits upon the circles 
of the universe, rides upon the tumultuous winds of 

75 



human discord, and manages the seas of tempestu- 
ous passion and temporal power. Once judged, it 
now judges. Once without a champion, it is now the 
all-potent arbiter of the whole earth. Centuries of 
Antagonism have made it but stronger, fresher and 
stouter. Spies or no spies, Skepticism notwith- 
standing — in spite of suspicion, cowardice, selfish- 
ness and scandal — in spite of the idolatrous devo- 
tion of its people to ''The Golden Calf '' — 

''In spite of rock, and tempest roar, 
In spite of false lights on the shore" — 
it has gone on. Christianity has not jailed. Her 
representatives have often failed, and failed 
egregiously. But Christianity has not failed. The 
only message in the world today that is worth a 
farthing is her message. Satan has poured out upon 
her his vials of wrath only to develop her strength 
and cause her to shine with a greater lustre. The 
Almighty has indeed "made bare his holy arm in 
the eyes of all the nations, and all the ends of the 
earth shall see the salvation of our God." Virtue 
and liberty, equality and fraternity, justice and 
truth, are her children, clinging closely to the fringes 
of her skirts. A mighty, rising tide, she fills the 
earth and the seas with her fullness of faith and 
hope and love. 

Alas, that we should forget how the Lord hath 
helped us hitherto, in spite of ourselves, in spite of 
our enemies ! Alas, that we should fail to raise our 
grateful "Ebenezer," the criterion of faith, the me- 
morial of Divine guidance, the certified promise of 
successful conquest! 

76 



Why this stammering tongue? Wherefore that 
staggering step? Whence these faltering, Schism- 
scattered ranks? Begone this paralyzing passion 
for the flesh-pots of a Godless Materialism! Come, 
men; let us go up at once and possess the land. We 
are well able to overcome it. Neither fear ye the 
people of the land, for they are bread for us, their 
defence is broken down. Spike their obsolete, an- 
cient arguments — they have not produced a new one 
in nineteen centuries. Tom Paine has passed with 
all his blathering boasts into the drunken limbo of 
exploded delusions! Their vaporings have never 
precipitated a single drop of refreshing water on the 
parched tongues of thirsty souls. Their pretentious 
mouthings have never healed a broken heart, nor 
instilled hope whence hope had fled, nor caused a 
light to shine where the light had failed, nor de- 
livered a man from destitution and despair, nor dis- 
placed corrosive discontent with the joy of an in- 
finite gratitude. 

Call their empty bluffs; Voltaire is long since 
dead — but God still lives! Man has failed; but 
Christianity has never failed. Militarism has 
proved its mad, mendacious mediocrity; but the 
Golden Rule has everywhere disclosed its redeem- 
ing grace. The hierarchy of materialistic Imperial- 
ism, the haughty epaulets of destructive Criticism, 
the illiberality of ''Liberalism,'' the shallow non- 
sense of ''Transcendentalism,'' the superficialities of 
so-called "Radicalism," and the schismatic vagaries 
of every other Ism, have constructed calf-paths into 
a wilderness of unmitigated misery, but have never 

11 



saved a man from sin, nor filled a soul with the light 
and glory of life. 

But God has led His people on through all their 
faltering, through all the menace and threat and 
Devilish antagonisms of ten thousand foes, to the 
outer boundary of the complete fulfillment of His 
gracious promise. 

Nearly one-half of the population of the world 
now lives under Christian standards. Christianity 
is the religion of the governing races; and it alone 
has made them the governing races. Nominally 
Christian nations have increased the territory under 
their rule, from the year 1600 to the present time, a 
period of only 300 years, from about 7% of the 
world's surface to more than 82%, while non- 
Christian nations have receded from about 90% to 
only 18%. 

^Why should the wonders He hath wrought 
Be lost in silence and forgot?" 
Enclosed within the marvelous pages of the King- 
dom's history there is sufficient power and inspira- 
tion to move the world with all its braggart princi- 
palities and schismatic social and political heresies. 



2. The Testimony of Philosophy 

Christianity not only stands unique and supreme 
in the light of history, but man's faith in its tri- 
umphant prevalence is further confirmed by the 
testimony of philosophy, the true philosophy of 
life. In this we discover that it has justified itself 
at the bar of reason, however clouded the mind's 



perceptions, and notwithstanding the fact that man's 
mental processes are notoriously erratic, their un- 
aided conceptions disjointed and confused, their 
unrevised conclusions illogical and generally 
incorrect. 

The procedure of Christianity is always rational; 
its thinking is accurate, its feeling trustworthy, its 
action right. Its judgments are orderly and just. 
Its teachings are credible. Its results are satisfy- 
ing. So far as men are indeed reasonable they are 
driven to ratify its method and conclusions; they 
are compelled to acknowledge its unexceptionable 
wisdom, its invariable impartiality, and its un- 
doubted righteousness. In its house men have ever 
found ''bread enough and to spare,'' infinite en- 
lightenment, joy abounding, and a guidance that 
never fails. 

The distinguished Goethe's last word, with all 
his erudition and intellectual force, is a piteous cry 
for ''More light! more light!" Herbert Spencer 
finally admits that mere speculative human philoso- 
phy "fails" to answer the questions which man is 
compelled to raise concerning himself and sur- 
rounding things, "and fails the more the more it 
seeks." 

But Christianity approves itself to the thoughtful, 
open, candid mind — to the mind that honestly seeks, 
asks, knocks at the door of Truth. It satisfies the 
longing soul, quiets the fevered pulse of suspicion, 
and leads men out of the error and confusion of 
evil communications into the glory of right rela- 
tions, close under Heaven. "Eve hath not seen, nor 



ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man 
the things that God hath prepared for them that 
love him," who follow His reasoning, who think His 
thoughts after Him, without prejudice, out into the 
free atmosphere and resplendent light of His in- 
finite grace. 

It invites all men to a detached, unimpassioned, 
earnest and unbiased investigation of its spirit, pur- 
poses and offerings. It spreads its wares openly 
before the world, and says: Come, inspect; see for 
yourself; reach hither thy hand, and be not faith- 
less but believing; come buy, without money and 
without price ; come freely, boldly, and ye shall find 
rest unto your souls; if the beauty you find here, 
the fragrance, the melody, the sweetness, the tender- 
ness of touch, are not as represented, you are at per- 
fect liberty, at any time, to return the goods without 
let or hindrance. Thus it fearlessly challenges men 
to a close and dispassionate examination of its char- 
acter and claims. ^^Come now, and let us reason 
together, saith the Lord: though your sins be as 
scarlet, they shall be white as snow; though they be 
red like crimson, they shall be as wool." 

Paul ^^reasoned" with Felix; he reasoned ^^of 
righteousness, temperance, and judgment to come"; 
all of which were perfectly admissible as subjects of 
reasonable discussion. And as Paul thus reasoned 
with him, Felix ^^trembled"; for he was the repre- 
sentative of force, but Paul was the representative of 
grace. 

Force is an attribute of man; upon it man de- 
pends, and not on reason or grace. Force is not an 

80 



attribute of God; He compels no man, Caesar does. 
The world does. Materialism does. Every other 
Ism does. But God depends entirely on reason and 
grace. Man is without exception unreasonable. 
God is not. When man sets up an ostentatious 
''Age of Reason'' the world may expect an unusual 
display of force-full brutality. To Caesar man pays 
tribute. But the offerings of Christianity are 
wholly voluntary and free. It presents its ^'goods," 
which man is at liberty to decline; it taxes, tithes, 
coerces no one. 

The Principle of Christianity 

The principle of Christianity is the principle of 
freedom, the principle of voluntary service, Chris- 
tianity is not a tax-gatherer. It taxes no man. It 
^^tithes" no man. Judaism does. Mormonism does. 
Romanism does. And so has every other Ism done 
ever since Ism first split hum.anity from divinity, 
man from God, aw^ay back beyond the time of the 
giving of the Mosaic law. The principle of the tax, 
or the tithe, and the principle of Christianity, are 
fundamentally opposed to each other. The prin- 
ciple of the Sabbath of Judaism (the last day of 
the w^eek), and the Christian principle of a Day of 
Worship (the first day of the week — erroneously 
called the Sabbath by some), are fundamentally 
opposed to each other. 

The Christian Day of Worship (which Paganism 
has done its utmost to destroy, particularly since the 
Pagan name of Sunday was adroitly fastened upon 
it) and the Sabbath of Judaism are diametrically 
opposed to each other in principle. The Christian 

81 



^'first day of the week'' is not the Jewish ^'Sabbath," 
neither in chronology nor in principle. The Sab- 
bath, like the Jewish ^^tithe/' was essentially a tax, 
required by law, enforced by law. And this prin- 
ciple of a compulsory, coercive tax, is the essential, 
distinguishing principle of Ism, against which the 
whole moral and spiritual power of Christianity 
has been thrown from its inception. Jesus Christ 
did away, once and for all, with the whole abomin- 
able business. It is entirely contrary to all that the 
Christian scriptures of the New Testament teach us 
about the spirit and method of God. It is a de- 
lusive and obnoxious snare. It is the snare of 
Schism. And it has been the prolific hotbed of 
Schism, of revolution and rebellion, throughout the 
whole history of Ism. ^^The tax! The tax!" has 
been the mad mob-cry throughout all the generations 
of Materialism, man's alienation from God. 

Those earnest Christians who mistakenly pro- 
claim the principle of the tithe, are always con- 
strained to beg the whole fundamental question by 
the following qualification: ''But of course Chris- 
tian giving (the tithe was not a gift) must not end 
with the tithe, a tenth of one's income ; it should only 
begin there." The tithe, however, ends there. The 
tax ends there. When Ism has paid its ''tax," or its 
"tithe," it is through, it has fulfilled its financial 
obligation to the state, or to the church. With what 
remains after this legalistic obligation has been met, 
it may do as it pleases. The "tenth" may become a 
Pharisaical boast, and the residue an accursed 
prodigality — an "indulgence" which the tithe has 

82 



paid for. Has not the tither done his ''duty/' and 
done it most punctiliously perhaps ? And is he not 
therefore entirely free from all further claims upon 
him? He has kept the law! 

Ism's treatment of a legalistic Sabbath is pre- 
cisely the same. 'Tay your tax/' it says, ''and go 
your own way; pay your tithe, and go your own 
way; pay one-tenth of your income, and the balance 
of your income is yours; hand over the last day of 
the week, the Sabbath, strictly according to law, 
and the first six days of the week are yours — the 
Sabbath is the 'Lord's Day,' the other six days are 
not!" 

This is not the vital principle of Christianity. 
Christianity is a wholly voluntary stewardship. It 
is a voluntary "bond slave." It turns over every 
day to God, voluntarily. All are His. Six days it 
gives to Godly work, after having given the first 
day to Godly worship. Christianity gives all, not 
a tenth only, nor a seventh only; gives it, freely. 
The payment of a tax or a tithe is not "giving"; in 
no possible sense is it giving. The Sabbath is a 
thing required by Jiidaistic law; Christianity has 
no such legalistic institution. The tithe is a thing 
required by law; Christianity knows no such thing. 

Christianity says to a man: "You are God's, in 
body, mind and spirit; all you have is God's; your 
time is God's; your days are God's; your talents are 
God's; your money is God's; your houses and lands 
are God's; give God what is His. Your home is 
God's — give w^hat is God's to support that home, 
even if (as it may be) you have nothing left for 

83 



other Godly service, or but 'two mites'; well done, 
'thou good and faithful servant, enter thou into the 
joy of thy Lord'; thou hast done better than many a 
man would be doing if he were to give nine-tenths 
of his income to God's work outside of his home. 
Give — not 'grudgingly,' not 'of necessity,' but 
freely and 'cheerfully'; the joy of such giving is 
yours ; the blessing of such giving is yours ; and the 
entire responsibility of doing it, or not doing it, vol- 
untarily, is upon you (a sense of responsibility is an 
unexcelled schoolmaster!). Do not give 'ca- 
priciously' (that is, like a ^goat'), but give; do not 
give 'whimsically,' but give; give 'systematically,' 
but give. It is not a tax you are bringing (as Juda- 
ism brought ^all the tithes into the storehouse'), but 
a free gift, even as Jesus Christ and Divine grace 
are iht jree gifts of God." 

In this the essential principle of Christianity is 
wholly at stake, a principle that lies at the very roots 
of reclamation and reconstruction, without which 
human society will never he horn again, will never 
be saved from its present condition of decomposition, 

Christianity is not a ''levy arbitrarily imposed 
by some higher power over which man has no con- 
trol; but it everywhere proclaims ''the glorious lib- 
erty of the children of God.'' "Where the Spirit of 
the Lord is, there is liberty" — and nowhere else. 
Christianity is not a "conscription," it is not a 
"draft," made effectual by force; it is not a "sum- 
mons" issued and enforced by law; it is not a "dis- 
traint" executed by a constable, the consummate 
representative of civil law. It is a gracious call for 

84 



volunteers, and this is all it is. ^'Ye have been 
called unto liberty/' says Paul; therefore ''stand fast 
in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free; 
only use not liberty for an occasion to the flesh, but 
by love serve one another. '^ 

It is probably true that if Judaistic ''tithing" were 
adopted universally in the Christian church today, 
the monetary revenues of the Christian church would 
be increased five-fold (shame on the individual 
members of that church who thus make their lib- 
erty "an occasion to the flesh'M ) — but Christianity 
is not a money-getting tax-gatherer ; and by the 
adoption of one of the distinctive principles of Ism 
it would thus sacrifice the very foundation-stone on 
which it is built in Christ Jesus. 

Liberty Versus Legalism 

Nowhere in the New Testament is there the least 
suggestion of a "tithing" system, and nowhere in 
the early Christian church. Certainly not! After 
the day of Pentecost "they had all things common"; 
and they voluntarily "sold their goods and posses- 
sions, and parted them to all, according as any man 
had need." x\nd they were admonished: "Upon 
the first day of the week let each one of you lay by 
him in store, as he may prosper." And again: "Let 
each man do as he hath purposed in his heart (and 
not by hard-and-fast rule, rote, or law) ; not grudg- 
ingly, or of necessity; for the Lord loveth a cheerful 
(Greek: 'hilarious') giver'' — not a tax-payer, who 
studiously figures out and sets aside 10%, as if 
some assessor were waiting for him in an outside 

86 



room. There is nothing ^^hilarious'' about such a 
mechanically-devised ^ ^system." God did not ^^give'^ 
His only begotten Son by any such formal, carefully 
calculated, proportional, cut-and-dried '^system." 
Christianity is a matter of regenerate impulse, not 
one of differential calculus. It is question of re- 
deemed enthusiasm, not one of systematized mathe- 
matics, 

Judaism said: The tithe I take; the balance be- 
longs to you. Christianity says : I take nothing, all 
belongs to God ; I give ; I give freely ; and as I give 
I recall that ^^he which sov^eth sparingly shall reap 
also sparingly, and he which soweth bountifully 
shall reap also bountifully." 

The legalistic tithe is discriminative and unjust. 
It is unjust to the poor, and favorable to the rich. 
It discriminates against the princely 'Hwo mites" of 
the widow joyously given, and in favor of the beg- 
garly two millions of the prosperous, though given 
with a grunt. 

Judaism goes up into the Temple to pray. It is 
self-righteous because it has fulfilled the law, fail- 
ing to realize that Legalism is not the fulfilling of 
the law, but that ''love is the fulfilling of the law." 
It therefore flatters itself: ^^God, I thank thee that 
I am not as other men are. I fast twice in the week. 
I give tithes of all that I possess." I give one-tenth 
of my income to God — all the law requires of me. 
I give one day (the last day) in the week to God — 
the law asks no more. 

The Christian goes up into the Temple to pray. 
And standing afar off, not so much as lifting his 

86 



penitent eyes to Heaven, this is how he prays: ''God 
be merciful to me a sinner." Out of Thee I am just 
what other men are, poor, helpless, lost sinners. I 
am not worthy to be called Thy son. In mercy par- 
don my transgressions, receive me back into Thy 
house, and let me be one of Thy servants, for Jesus' 
sake. All that I have I give to Thee, all that I am; 
for all is Thine. I give freely. With unrestrained 
joy I give. For all is Thine; and I am Thine — 
and Thou art my gracious God. ^ 

Here is not only a difference of formal system. 
If that were all it would be a matter of small mo- 
ment, deserving little consideration in this connec- 
tion. But here is a fundamental difference of prin- 
ciple, by which Christianity stands or falls! x^nd 
only so far as Ism has prevailed in the animating 
principles and practices of the Christian church has 
the Christian church failed, before God, and before 
the whole world! 

In all its length and breadth Legalism is the same 
damning curse today that it was in the days of the 
Lord Jesus Christ. Some of the most successfully 
Godless men in America have kept all the law, most 
punctilliously, ''from their youth up." And they are 
therefore flattered, by the Christian church as well 
as by their own deluded souls, for being quite right- 
eous. Consequently they think they need not Christ ; 
and they repudiate the very principles of essential 
Christianity. They have "a form of Godliness," 
but it is an empty sham, without pith or power. 
And the world mocks them — as it mocks the Chris- 
tian church ! 

87 



Paul tells us that the law was our schoolmaster 
to bring us to Christ, that we might be justified by 
faith, in Him — for by the deeds of the law can no 
flesh living be justified. Paul did not say that what 
is legal is right, God forbid! On the other hand 
he assures us that what is faith-iull is right. And 
w^hen a Christian gives he gives, not ^^ according to 
law," but according to faith-full grace; not by for- 
mal system, but by redeemed, shackle-free senti- 
ment, as each one ^'purposes in his heart/' not me- 
chanically calculates in his head like a bank cash- 
ier or a professional money-lender; apart from 
which vital principle Christianity is only another 
vexatious variation of Ism, the Sabbath another his- 
toric taskmaster, Christian ''giving'' another obnox- 
ious Despotism. 

Christianity is the very center, substance and 
sponsor of freedom; or it is only one more of the 
tinkling cymbals of Materialism. As a matter of 
fact, however, it is the only institution or propa- 
ganda the world has ever known that has paid all 
due deference, without distinction, to him who is 
created in the very image of God, whose right to 
life and liberty is incontestible and really inde- 
structible. It never treats immortal men as mere 
automiatons, much less as dumb, driven cattle, fitted 
only for bit and bridle, and to be goaded by some 
Godless tyranny; but as intelligent, rational beings, 
created to think, able to judge, free to choose. 

The Devil drives men. Christianity invites men. 
Ism imposes a coercive, legalistic tax. Christianity 
asks a ''free gift," and leaves it to men to do about 



it as they freely will, always bearing in mind that 
'^as a man thinketh in his heart so is he.'' For as a 
man thinks, he feels; as he feels, he wills; as he 
wills, he does; and as he does, he is — conduct is the 
mother of character, just as the will is the ultimate 
spring of choice, and as a man's conduct is the sum 
of his choices. 

And if men will be honest about it, if they will 
know the true test and touchstone of Christianity, 
here it is: Christianity never makes a fnan pay 
tribute to it. It never seeks to enslave the human 
mind, but to set it free. It does not compel a man 
to let it do his thinking for him. Ism does. Chris- 
tianity does not. It never sets out to bring; his senti- 
ments into bondage, but to emancipate them. It 
never throws a lariat around his will, but strives 
only to release his will from the fetters that are al- 
ready fastened upon it. '^Ephraim is joined to his 
idols," and if he likes it, if he will not listen to rea- 
son or be redeemed by grace, if he is willing to 
stand the consequences and pay the price of his 
apostacy, '^let him alone." 

It says to a man: It is entirely up to you to do 
your own thinking, your own feeling, your own will- 
ing; it is entirely up to you to do your own praying, 
your own giving, your own living, voluntarily, freely, 
and without autocratic dictation on my part. It is 
never a profiteering interloper between a man and 
that man's God. Ism is. Christianity is not. 

Salvation by Grace, Not by Force 
Man cannot be redeemed by legislative enactment. 
Redemption is a matter of personal desire and vol- 

89 



untary choice. And it was only when the Christian 
church began to fall from grace, began to belittle 
and repudiate the means of grace, began to force 
men to accept it, by statutory laws executed by civil 
courts and a fullarmed policeman, that the Chris- 
tian church began to fail, and to merit the vengeful 
oppositions and mad maledictions of an unbelieving 
world. 

Redemption is a free confession of a saving faith, 
not the enforced impression of a formal creed. It 
must originate in man himself, spontaneously, God 
having first prepared the Way, set before him the 
open Door of opportunity, surrounded him with ap- 
propriate influences, arguments and persuasions. 
The church is the Bride of Christ; and those who 
comprise the church must be wooed and won, not 
threatened and coerced. And the world has never 
known such a winning wooer as Jesus, so gracious 
in His attentions, so devoted, so generous and free 
in His gifts. It is a sorry spectacle, therefore, to 
see His representatives repudiating the ways of a 
w^ooer and resorting to all sorts of threats, tricks, 
cajolings, legerdemain and legalistic compulsions in 
order to win this Bride! With what result? They 
have only offended her, disaffected her, driven her 
away in resentful disgust. Christianity never rails 
at her: Marry me, or go to Hell! These are not the 
ways of a wooer. 

The final issue of redemption is with man him- 
self as a free moral agent. Therefore, ''Seek ye the 
Lord while he may be found ; call ye upon him while 
he is near." Therefore the prodigal son is repre- 

90 



sented as saying, ^^I will arise, and go unto my 
father." There is no compulsion in any case. God 
has never failed to respect man's personal liberty, 
his freedom of will; and He only! When the prodi- 
gal insisted on having his portion, he received it. 
This puts the responsibility where it belongs, and 
where it should belong — on man himself. When 
man cries out for ^'personal liberty he claims what 
is his by Divine right; also the tremendous responsi- 
bility that accompanies this right. How highly he 
seems to prize this right, the right to be free; and 
how lightly he regards the responsibility it entails! 
But the two things are absolutely one and in- 
separable. 

Man's eternal salvation is not enforced. Its de- 
termination is and must be spontaneous with him. 
God having graciously prepared it for him he is 
entirely free to accept or decline it. Man's eternal 
condemnation is not enforced; its determination is 
and must be spontaneous with him. It must be and 
is a matter of free choice on his part. Christianity 
does not force a man into Heaven, or Hell. Which- 
ever way a man goes, under God, he goes freely, 
God allows him the thing which God gave him in 
the beginning, perfect personal liberty, the liberty 
to choose and act for himself — and its consequences ! 

The state proceeds to deliberately stop him by 
civil statute, enforced by the police, Christianity 
does not thus proceed. It does not work by and 
through civil law. It never calls in the police. It is 
not an officer of the law. Civil law requires force 
to make it effective; and the essential force back of 

91 



civil law are the police powers of Materialism. 
Force interferes with human freedom; Christianity 
does not. Force arouses resentment and revenge; 
but Christianity awakens gratitude and devoted 
service. Christianity works by moral law only, by 
grace through faith. Moral law is neither pro- 
hibitory nor mandatory — in a civil, physical, mate- 
rialistic sense. Civil law is both. Christianity has 
nothing directly to do with civil law, except to obey 
it with uncomplaining loyalty. Civil statutes are 
made by politicians. Christianity is not in politics. 
It is not at all concerned ^'in'' political government. 
It is concerned wholly in the eternal salvation of 
men and women personally. And it is high time for 
the professed followers of Jesus Christ to find this 
out, to draw the line sharply, to ^^come out from 
among them and be separate," to ^^touch not the un- 
clean thing" called politics, to withdraw from the 
gross Materialism of worldly empire. Politics is 
not corrupt because bad men are in it; but bad men 
are in it because it is essentially corrupt. 

But some evil one says, ^'J^^t think what a tre- 
mendous advantage it would be if the Christian 
church came into full possession and control of the 
kingdoms of this world and the glory of them!" 
Has not that lure a familiar sound? Who was the 
original author of it? And did not that very thing 
practically come to pass in the Fourth Century after 
Christ, in the days of Constantine the Great? With 
what result? Instead of the Pagan world being 
Christianized y the Christian church was Paganized! 
And the cause of Jesus Christ, fifteen centuries after 

92 



dote, is still suffering woefully from that fearful 
defection. 

What political government needs most is that its 
citizenry should be made up of Godly men and 
women, saved men and women, patient, pure and 
peaceful, loyal and industrious, obedient and sober, 
generous in their regard for others, eschewing sel- 
fish, greed-engendering rivalries, considerate and 
kind, devoted to charity and beneficence, full of 
faith and gratitude. And the Christian can best ful- 
fill his obligations to the state, the obligations of his 
earthly citizenship (they are numerous and impor- 
tant), and be a Christian indeed and in truth, by 
confining himself to the work that Jesus Christ 
bade him do — ^^not slothful in business, fervent in 
spirit, serving the Lord; rejoicing in hope, patient 
in tribulation, continuing instant in prayer; dis- 
tributing to the necessity of saints, given to hospi- 
tality." Is not this quite sufficient to occupy his 
mind and time fully — and to keep him out of mis- 
chief? He should love without dissimulation, abhor 
that which is evil, cleave to that which is good; be 
kindly affectioned to his fellowman with brotherly 
consideration, in honor preferring the other to him- 
self; blessing those that persecute him; rejoicing 
with the happy, weeping with the sorrowful; culti- 
vating Mutuality, endeavoring to keep the unity of 
the Spirit in the bond of peace — even ivhen the God- 
lessness of the world sneers at him as a ''slacker/' 
or despitefully abuses him as a '' pacifist ; minding 
not high things, but condescending to men of low 
estate ; recompensing no man evil for evil — no mat- 

93 



ter what his nationality; not wise in his own con- 
ceits — even though he be a professor of metaphysics 
in some famous university; providing things hon- 
est in the sight of all men — in spite of his racial or 
commercial prejudices; feeding his hungry enemy, 
and giving drink to him if he be thirsty. He should 
not avenge himself, however plausible the excuse, 
but should leave vengeance to Him to whom it be- 
longs, and who alone is able to administer it right- 
eously; overcoming evil with good; seeking to save 
the lost, and not to execute them; delivering those 
that are ^^dead in trespasses and sins," and not de- 
stroying them. 

Christianity says, ^^Wist ye not that I must be 
about my Father's business?" — or, ^4n my Father's 
courts," which is the truer translation — as the boy 
Jesus said to His parents in the Temple. ^'I am 
come," it says, ^'to do the will of my Father and 
your Father." Its place is not in the inside courts 
and counsels of Materialism. Its duty is not in de- 
vising the ways and means of political government. 
Its business is not in the counting-room of avaricious 
Commercialism. 

Spiritual Power, Not Politics 

Is the Christian therefore a preacher and promoter 
of sedition? Of all men he is the farthest removed 
from this. Does he therefore renounce and con- 
demn industrial occupation? There is no man as 
honestly and ardently and dependably industrious 
as he. Does his whole-hearted devotion to ' 'heav- 
enly" citizenship mean that he refuses to ''pay trib- 

94 



ute to Caesar," and that he plans rebellion against 
^^the powers that be"? Nothing could be more ma- 
liciously false and libelous, though his demon- 
possessed enemies have hurled this very accusation 
at him constantly ever since the days of Pontius 
Pilate. On the contrary, the man of such character 
and life is the very salt of the earth, the only ele- 
ment in the midst of these ^'powers'^ that saves them 
from swift destruction. 

Christianity, and Christianity only, has every- 
where and always taught, in outstanding terms that 
shall live forever: ^Tet every soul be subject unto 
the higher powers" — this to the Christians at Rome, 
living under the ominous shadow of the palaces of 
the Caesars, victims of the most barbarous and 
despotic of autocrats! ^Tor there is no power but 
of God" — and time proved it in the history of the 
Roman empire. ^'The powers that be are ordained* 
of God. Whosoever therefore resisteth (interferes 
with) the power, resisteth the ordinance (interferes 
in the supreme authority) of God: and they that 
resist (interfere) shall receive unto themselves 
damnation" — another most unfortunate rendering; 
for the Greek word translated ^ ^damnation" is 



*NoTE. — In the original the Greek word is ''tctagmcnai" 
a military term that means ''placed under," and consequently 
"answerable to." The so-called ''higher powers" are not 
*'ordained" of God in the generally accepted and popular 
sense of the term; but they have been placed under the juris- 
diction of His court, and they will be required to give a 
strict account of themselves to Him, the highest power, the 
source of all power, in due course of Divine judgment. 

In a passage immediately preceding this, Paul says, "for 
it is written, Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord." 

95 



''krima/' from which the English word '^crime" is 
derived. Sin is the transgression of the law of God. 
Crime is the transgression of the civil law. A man 

Therefore His people are admonished to ''be subject unto 
the powers that be," in patient forbearance, in loyal, uncom- 
plaining obedience; and to leave the execution of just judg- 
ment on them to Him to whom it belongs and who only can 
administer judgment righteously and fully. Moreover, if 
His people should impatiently interfere, in ways and by 
means of their own human devising, they would only heap 
fuel on the hellish flames of resentment. At the same time 
they had their hands quite full with the preaching of the 
Gospel of salvation, and with reminding ''the powers that be'* 
of their responsibility to a higher power who in due time 
would bring them into judgment. 

Therefore abide God's time in patience, and by no means 
fight fire with fire. Leave all to His wisdom and power, and 
do not adopt the weapons and methods of Carnalism, the 
ways and means of the Devil; but by submissive faith, hope 
and charity, witness the divinity of your mission. In all of 
which this converted Jew declared against Judaism (all ism) 
and preached Christianity. 

The use of the English word "ordained" in the so-called 
'^authorized" version of the New Testament (the authors of 
which were still under the spell of the "divine right of 
kings") is a most misleading translation of the original text 
and a gross perversion of its meaning. It would make it 
appear to most readers that God was the responsible author 
of "the powers that be," or that He had put His seal of 
approval upon them, with all their historic record of tyranny, 
corruption and crime, that He had specially "ordained" 
(originated, ordered, endorsed) them. Nothing could be 
more absolutely false. He has permitted sin; but He is not 
the author of sin, nor has He ordained sin. And He has 
permitted sin because He could not prevent sin without de- 
stroying the inalienable liberty with which He himself en- 
dowed man in the beginning. 

In the same manner also has He permitted "the powers 
that be." Leave them to Him until the harvest. They have 
been taken and "placed under" the Divine jurisdiction of His 
court. Do not interfere with them. Do not oppose them. 
But rather conciliate them — and cleave to the Gospel of grace 
and truth. 

96 



may therefore sin without committing a crime, and 
he may commit a crime without committing a sin. 
But Paul says, do not subject yourselves to ''in- 
crimination"; do not ''incriminate" yourselves; do 
not interfere with the civil authorities ; do not break 
the civil laws ; do not put yourselves in a position to 
be adjudged "criminals." 

Here is citizenship worth while; it is the citizen- 
ship of the Christian who seeks peace and pursues 
it, who goes about his Father's business in his 
Father's way, and without interfering with his 
Father's exclusive prerogatives. Yet Browning's 
familiar effusion, 

"God's in His heaven. 
All's right wath the world," 

while a very delightful poetic fancy, is false to the 
facts. It contains the same old insidious fiction. 
All's wrong with the world as long as "God's in His 
heaven." All's right with the world only when the 
world receives Him out of His heaven into its own 
heart and life, through His Word and Spirit, by the 
faith of His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ. 

The "powers that be" are not all right, but all 
wrong. Are they not God's "ministers"? some one 
asks. They certainly are. But so are all the wicked 
the "ministers"of God — w^ho makes even"the wrath 
of man to praise him." And they all shall receive 
their reward in due course of God's Providence. 
They are justly entitled to the wages they have 
earned, which w^ages He w^ill see to it that they re- 
ceive promptly and in full when pay-day comes. 

97 



Leave all that to Him, says Paul to the Romans ; 
for it is His exclusive function, and He only is able 
to administer ''justice'' justly. Meanwhile the re- 
deemed have all they can possibly do to preach 
Christ. They are ministers; God Himself is the 
paymaster. They are not court, counsel, or jury in 
their present sphere of action; they are but wit- 
nesses. Therefore Jesus says, ^'Judge not, that ye 
be not judged" — ^judgment is His prerogative, not 
that of the witness. It is not the business of the wit- 
ness to give opinions; that is the business of the 
Court only. Let no man presume to trespass upon 
the exclusive domain of the Court. 

And when the Son of Man cometh both the re- 
deemed and the rebellious shall receive their abso- 
lutely just deserts, in full, at the hands of God, 
^^every man according to that he hath done," strictly. 

Could anything be more fair? Is not a man 
fairly entitled to what he has fairly earned? He 
shall have it — but only at the hands of God ! This 
is Christianity. If men do not like it let them be 
done with it, and not belie it. 

There was no nobler citizen, no truer or more val- 
uable citizen, in the whole Roman empire than the 
Apostle Paul, who was not ^4n" politics, but who 
gave himself assiduously to the ministry of Jesus 
Christ, and to the Christ life, as ordered of God. 
Yet this same Paul writes, ''Our conversation (a 
word sometimes rendered ^citizenship'; the Greek 
word is ^politeuma,' that is, ^polities') is in heaven.'' 
But the materialist has frequently been known to 
sneer contemptuously at the Christian who testifies 

98 



that his '^citizenship is in heaven." Nevertheless 
this man, if true to his Christian testimony, has al- 
ways been, in every respect, a far more faithful and 
desirable citizen of earth than the materialist. He 
is a ' 'fellow-citizen (fellow-politician) with the 
saints, and of the household of God." And he is far 
end away the most worthy and useful citizen of 
every nation. But he is not in the politics of ''the 
powers that he,'' he is not a fellow-politician w4th 
the Herodians, he is not of the household of Mate- 
rialism. 

Ism is in the politics of the kingdoms of this 
w^orld. Mormonism, Judaism, Romanism, Social- 
ism, Sectarianism, all are deeply and actively con- 
cerned in political government. Christianity is not. 
Ism is thoroughly involved in the tumult and vain- 
glorious strife of earthly empire. Christianity is 
not, but is over and above them all. Politics, so- 
called, is materialistic. Political government is ma- 
terialistic. Christianity is spiritual, not material; it 
is moral, not mortal; it is eternal, not temporal; it 
is heavenly, not earthly. 

All these are the things that distinctly differen- 
tiate Christianity from Ism. Its thoughts are 
higher than man's thoughts. Its w^ays are higher 
than man's ways. Materialism is of the earth, 
earthy; Christianity is the Lord from Heaven, liv- 
ing with a man personally, living in a man per- 
sonally, by that man's free choice and consent. It 
is the only government in the history of the human 
race that exists by and with ''the consent of the 
governed'" ; and it is consequently the only govern- 

99 



ment exercising ^^just" powers over the governed. 
Faithful Christians openly confess that they are 
^^strangers and pilgrims on the earth; and they that 
say such things declare plainly that they seek a 
country, that they look for a city that hath founda- 
tions, whose builder and maker is God. And truly 
if they had been mindful of that country from 
whence they came out, they might have had oppor- 
tunity to have returned; but now they desire a better 
country, that is, an heavenly: wherefore God is not 
ashamed to be called their God; for he hath pre- 
pared for them a city." And in the nation to which 
they go there is no legalistic tax; it is supported and 
sustained in every department by voluntary contri- 
butions exclusively. 

Sinners are born, not made. The human race is 
a branch of the family of God ; but a branch broken 
off. Essential sin is this ^ ^broken off" condition. 
It is separation from God. And this is all it is. 
But this is enough. All a branch needs is to be 
broken off; eternal rot will ensue in the natural 
course of things. Man is sinful by nature. Long 
before he was born his ancestors broke away from 
God, moved into a country foreign to God's King- 
dom, became ^^naturalized" citizens of a hostile na- 
tion, ^^aliens from the commonwealth of Israel," ex- 
patriates; and man was ^^born abroad," born of a 
broken-off, removed, alienated branch. And all that 
man needs is to get back to God, back to God's 
country, back into the citizenship in which his fam- 
ily was created, back to the original Fatherland of 
man, for which he was intended, as a fish is intended 

100 



for the sea, and without which he cannot live, live 
in liberty, live in the peaceful pursuit of happiness. 
An immortal soul, he must get back into the essen- 
tial relationship of eternal life; and this is in God. 

Divine Mercy, Not Civil Law 

Sinners are born; but criminals are made. First 
there must be a civil statute. Crime is the trans- 
gression of civil statute. There would be no '^crime" 
if there were no such statutes. And a man becomes 
a criminal by his ovm act. But he is a sinner by 
birth, just as he is born a Frenchman, an American, 
a Russian, a Gentile, or a Jew. He has nothing to 
do with it. He is not consulted about it. No plea, 
however specious, can affect the fact. No complaint 
can change its complexion. He cannot deny his 
birth. He cannot deny his nationality. He may 
seek to hide it all; but the truth will come out, ulti- 
mately, in spite of every precaution and effort to 
keep it concealed. In sin did his mother conceive 
him — right or wrong, fair or unfair, desirable or 
hateful, the fact prevails; he is a Negro, or a China- 
man, or an Indian, or a Caucasian — he is a sinner. 

And this does not mean, essentially and neces- 
sarily, that his mother was ^^mmoral," or that she 
was not ^Virtuous," in the ordinary acceptation of 
these terms; not at all. But it means that she con- 
ceived him in an alien land, in a commonwealth 
foreign to faith, in the hostile citizenship of infi- 
delity, in a ^^broken-off" relationship, in the enemy's 
country, in separation from God. Here, and here 
only, is the essence of the ^^ total depravity" of man; 
it is as "total" as is the racial quality of the full- 

101 



blooded Negro, or Hindu. It does not mean, at 
least primarily, that man is totally ^'immoral," that 
there is not ^^some good" in every man, in a loose^ 
superficial sense. A Jew may possess some of the 
characteristics of a Gentile ; he is nevertheless a Jew^ 
through and through, for he was born a Jew. 

Man is ''totally depraved'' because of his com- 
plete alienation from God. For a time, to the human 
eye, this severed branch may boast a foliage finer, 
fuller, more luxuriant than that of any branch on the 
tree ; but it is broken off, and time will tell the whole 
story of its downfall. Could anything be worse? 
Such a branch does not need to have a nest of cater- 
pillars among its leaves; it is already dead, cut off, 
hopeless — all the elements of decomposition are at 
war within it. Man may not be a criminal ; but he 
is a sinner. Crime is made by civil law, and by 
man's personal transgression of civil law. But a 
Negro is born a Negro; and a sinner is born a 
sinner. 

The Christian has been mistaking his business, 
abusing his privileges and w^asting his precious 
time, by countenancing and even condoning essen- 
tial sin and condemning crime. He has been en- 
gaged largely in fighting crime. His business is to 
preach Christ. He has been fighting immorality; 
now let him extol fidelity. There is no essential sin 
but alienation; yet he does business with alienation, 
the while he fights a fatuous ^lawlessness" by ever- 
increasing and equally fatuous legislation. He has 
been ''beating the air" — with an empty, infected 
sack; scattering germs instead of dispensing grace. 

102 



He has been manufacturing criminals, by the whole- 
sale manufacture of civil statutes; and the world's 
case has been none bettered thereby — essentially. 
He has largely missed his calling; he has brought 
even civil law itself, and ^ ^justice," into popular dis- 
repute. The result is a wild. Godless Materialism 
— Imperialism, Socialism so-called (and its ulti- 
mate offspring called Bolshevism), Commercialism, 
Capitalism, and the like; all of which are the fruits 
of Materialism, and its foolish, factitious, laws of 
force, backed of necessity by Militarism — the police 
multiplied ! 

For example: Christianity is not interested in 
the ''blue laws of 1794'' ; neither is it interested in 
the green laws of 1919. Then why will Christian 
men make such an ado over these laws, and their 
enforcement by the militaristic police powers of a 
Godless Materialism? Christianity is interested 
only in the moral and spiritual laws of i\lmighty 
God, among w^hich is the law of ^^the first day of the 
week," six days for Godly w^ork, and this day for 
Godly worship. What more should the man of God 
want? Let him observe this law himself, proclaim 
it from the housetops, and urge it upon the respect- 
ful consideration of the people by every Christian 
means. When he resorts to civil law, when he es- 
says to force men into the service of God, when he 
calls in the police (and these things are inseparably 
associated), he does several things: he witnesses his 
own failure as God's servant, he witnesses the inade- 
quacy of his own peculiar weapons as the servant of 
God and brings them into derision, he creates a lot 

103 



of criminals, and he bitterly antagonizes the very 
people he would win — he simply adds fuel to the 
fire of revenge. For the man whom God made free 
will not be forced; he may be compelled to submit 
for a time, but he will soon or late break away. 
Then, if the people insist on turning this divinely 
appointed Day of Worship into an occasion of sel- 
fish, Godless secularity, let them do so — and suffer 
the consequences. 

If ^^Ephraim is joined to his idols, let him alone." 
Ephraim is a tribe, a race, a nation, one of the 
^'higher powers"; do not interfere with him; he is 
^ ^placed under" God, and God will attend to his case 
justly in due season. Meanwhile let Ephraim' s sin 
he upon his own head. Let the responsibility of his 
persistent Godlessness rest where it belongs. Do 
not ^'resist" him; do not attempt to force him; do 
not unnecessarily increase his antagonism and re- 
sentment; and ^^do not fret thyself" because of him; 
let him alone. There is nothing he dislikes as much 
as to be let alone; nothing disarms him as quickly. 
There is nothing as disagreeable and terrifying to 
him as personal responsibility. Let him have it all ; 
do not put yourself in a position in which you share 
it with him. Do not meet him on his own ground, 
with his own weapons of force, with his own meth- 
ods — with all of which he is far more familiar than 
you. Thus, too, you flatter him and his weapons 
and his battlefield and his methods, and give re- 
doubled assurance to his thrusts. Meet him on 
your ground, with your weapons and methods, and 

104 



you undo him while you glorify your own God-given 
mission. Otherwise '^let him alone'M 

Ephraim rebels against coercion, which only 
lends excuse and plausibility to his lost cause; but 
if let alone to pursue his own wild ways, his rebel- 
lion soon crumbles under the cumbrous weight of 
the responsibility they impose, and by virtue of their 
own lack of virtue. Coercion feeds the fires of re- 
bellion, and aggressive opposition is the tough tree 
of the forest against which the Beast whets his tusk 
for a sharper encounter. The effectiveness of any 
forceful blow depends entirely on the resistance with 
which it meets. If no resistance is encountered the 
blow but beats the air with no harm done — except 
to him who delivers it. 

Civil law cannot look liberty in the face without 
flinching. Human ''Justice" cannot take off her 
blindfold and face Truth without faltering. Peniten- 
tiaries are not decent ; and they cannot be made de- 
cent. The electric chair is a savage barbarity with 
which Christianity has nothing to do. It was Ism 
(Judaism) that said, ''An eye for an eye, and a tooth 
for a tooth." Christianity has never said that; but 
it has said the exact reverse of that. Capital pun- 
ishment by the cold-blooded processes of civil law is 
more uncivil than the crime it signalizes, and it has 
created more crime than it has ever suppressed. The 
execution of such human judgment on human life 
has made human life cheaper and more common, 
not more sacred and precious. It is so brutal that 
the more respectable elements in every so-called civ- 
ilized community hire men more brutal than them- 

105 



selves to execute the sentence they themselves could 
not be persuaded to carry out. No wonder they bind 
the eyes of ''Justice'' ; she dare not he allowed to 
look upon the legalized crime that constantly has 
been committed in her fair name. And the modern 
world unjustly blames it on Christianity, because 
nominal Christians have not only been parties to it, 
but have been its active promoters, in open and abso- 
lute violation of the spirit, method and admonition 
of Jesus Christ their Lord. 

No power on earth can make a true Christian 
usurp the exclusive function of Almighty God in 
this connection. No power on earth can make such 
an one deliberately take the life of his fellow man, 
however plausible the excuse, by a hangman's rope, 
by an electric shock, by the firing of a gun, or by 
the savage thrust of a bayonet. Is he a coward 
because he will not carry a gun? The real coward 
is afraid to go z/n-armed. The true Hero carries 
no sword; and to his would-be defender who draws 
one He says, ^Tut up thy sword" — it smites the 
hand that wields it far more frequently than it slays 
the one against which it is drawn. And there is 
nothing heroic in hanging helplessness f — What sav- 
ages these mortals be ! 

Some years ago a distinguished jurist, then gov- 
ernor of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, said 
to the writer: ^^The legislature of this common- 
wealth is a criminal factory; it is engaged in mak- 
ing laws, laws, laws — and then more laws to en- 
force the laws it has made; prohibitory laws, 
mandatory laws, all sorts of laws — laws that will 

106 



not be kept, that cannot be kept, that should not be 
kept; and every law-breaker is a criminal; conse- 
quently there is not a man, woman, or child in this 
commonwealth who is not in some way and to some 
degree a criminal." 

Lawlessness is the offspring of Legalism. 

Christianity prohibits nothing by civil law, en- 
forced necessarily by clubs and bayonets. It is not 
engaged in the business of making criminals, and 
then executing so-called '^justice" on the criminals 
it has made. Christianity is engaged in the redemp- 
tion of sinners, through the atoning sacrifice of 
God's Son on Calvary, by faith. And it is not en- 
gaged in anything else however specious the entice- 
ment. Ism is. Christianity is not. Christianity is 
not a lawmaker, but a Savior from the curse of the 
law. It is an emancipator and a pardoner, not a 
hangman. It is a Redeemer, not an executioner. 
The unrepentent murderer, the impenitent thief, is 
his own executioner — just as Judas ^Svent and 
hanged himself,'' Jesus knew that Judas was a 
traitor and thief, but let him go, in his own w^ay, 
by his own free choice. Therefore it is recorded 
that ''J^d^s by transgression fell, that he might go 
to his own place,'' It is not God's place; it is the 
sinner's place, for sin made it, and the sinner goes to 
it of his own free will. Christianity never interdicts 
a man's freedom, and Christianity only. It says to 
man: If you will go, go; I cannot stop you, and I 
would not if I could, if stopping you in any way 
interfered with your God-given liberty of choice and 
action. 

107 



Christ Man's Servant, Not His Censor 

Christianity does not bar the gate to God with 
hierarchical usurpations. It does not arrogantly or 
insidiously block the way to the throne of grace, but 
opens up that way to all, without money and with- 
out price. It does not say: ''You cannot get by 
unless you pay tribute to me, and kiss the toe of 
some pretentious earthly potentate," the last issue 
of Pagan arrogance and degradation ! 

Christianity is not a hold-up, but a lift-up. It 
exalts Jesus Christ, God's Eternal Son; itself it does 
not exalt, but humbles itself, even unto death. It 
follows in the steps of Him who sent it forth into 
the earth to speak words of salvation, at any cost to 
itself — to do deeds of deliverance, even unto the 
death-encircled brow of agonizing Golgotha. It 
emulates His example. It assiduously seeks to ex- 
alt and enlighten man, to surround him with such 
evidences, testimony, data and influences as will 
liberate him from the shackles of sin and delusion, 
and not bind him with a still baser bondage; such 
as will make it possible for him to reach right con- 
clusions and form just judgments. It hands him 
the open Bible and says : This is what I have to say 
about God and man, about death and immortality, 
about sin and salvation, about life and liberty, 
about faith, hope and charity, about Jesus Christ; 
read it, think about it, ponder it in your heart, draw 
your own conclusions, and choose for yourself — I 
cannot do it for you. 

Christianity teaches a man to think, to feel, to 
act; to think wisely, to feel truly, to act rightly; 

108 



and to do all this, ^^not grudging and of necessity," 
but freely, on his own personal initiative and re- 
sponsibility. It says to a man : I am not here to be 
ministered unto, but to minister, and to give my life 
a ransom for many; God made thee in his own 
image, and I am thy servant ; I throw myself at the 
footstool of thy throne, O man whom God made — 

man for whom Christ died; I do not ask of thee 
unwilling and servile obedience; I only ask that I 
may be thy helper, a stepping-stone to Him; ''/ be- 
seech thee by the mercies of God/^ not by the in- 
timidations of civil law, nor by the accompanying 
prods of a policeman's club; I make myself ^^of no 
reputation," only that I may glorify God, and thee; 

1 require no material compensations, seek no self- 
aggrandizement, exact no tribute for my account; 
walk over my prostrate body if thou wilt, to eternal 
deliverance — and my purpose will be fulfilled, my 
soul will be satisfied. 

Paganism has never said that! A counterfeit 
Christianity has never done that! On the contrary 
these are both selfish, autocratic, materialistic, com- 
mercial ; and they seek, not to set man free, but to 
shackle his understanding, to hobble his will, to 
chain his actions to their jeweled chariot wheels as 
did the ancient Roman conquerors with those they 
brought back as trophies of the Godless aggression 
of an accursed autocracy. 

Christianity does not plunder; it protects, pro- 
vides, imparts. 

Here is its true touchstone and test. 

109 



The '^fire and sword" of licentious Mohamme- 
danism never stain or blacken its fair fingers. With 
no barbaric ^inquisition," thumb-screw and rack, 
does it endeavor to coerce the unyielding heart. No 
darkened dungeon, nor den of beasts, nor raging 
stake, denote its pathway; for all these things are 
not the creatures of Christianity, but the creatures 
of Ism — Imperialism, Romanism, Socialism, Mo- 
hammedanism, Sectarianism, and the like — the 
creatures of his Hellish genius who dominates the 
lives of those whose fear of God is simply fierce 
Fanaticism, whose regard for man tends only to his 
degradation, whose god is Baal, whose agent is a 
beastly constable, whose only crown is a conscience- 
less Commercialism, besotted with the lust of power, 
drunk with the soul-destroying concoctions of a 
Devilish Materialism. — What concord hath the tem- 
ple of God with a constable? 

In Reason's Ear 

Christianity presents man with this Book, and 
says : Here it is ; study it for yourself, account for it. 
It takes him out into Nature's fields, under Na- 
ture's stars, and says: Here they are; explain them. 
It lays before him the whole course of sacred his- 
tory, like that of a great ship, true to chart and 
compass, pursuing its appointed way in the midst of 
a tempestuous sea, along a rocky coast, with dan- 
gerous shoals beneath, the Wrecker's misleading sig- 
nals on every side, insubordination and mutiny 
aboard, and it asks: Who was the Master mariner? 
It points out to him a thousand evidences of design 

no 



on every hand, and considerately inquires: Who 
was the designer? It calls his attention to this uni- 
versal, innate sense of immortality, this everpresent 
realization of personal responsibility to some higher 
power, this irrepressible acknowledgment of man's 
utter insufficiency, this inescapable conviction of 
judgment to come, and challenges him to tell just 
what it means. It sings to him this old, impressive 
hymn, in melody and measure the like of which the 
human mind has not elsewhere discovered in all the 
tumultuous annals of the human race : 

^^The spacious firmament on high. 
With all the blue ethereal sky. 
And spangled heavens, a shining frame, 
Their great Original proclaim. 

The unwearied sun, from day to day. 
Does his Creator's power display, 
And publishes to every land 
The work of an Almio;htv hand. 

Soon as the evening shades prevail. 
The moon takes up the wondrous tale, 
And nightly to the listening earth 
Repeats the story of her birth; 

Whilst all the stars that round her burn, 
And all the planets in their turn, 
Confirm the tidings as they roll, 
And spread the truth from pole to pole. 
Ill 



What though in solemn stillness all 
Move round the dark terrestrial ball? 
What though no real voice nor sound 
Amid their radiant orbs be found? 

In reason's ear they all rejoice, 
And utter forth a glorious voice; 
Forever singing as they shine, 
'The Hand that made us is Divine'.'' 

Christianity says to man: There it is; that's my 
h}Tiin, and tens of millions of my people are con- 
stantly singing it, with a unanimous joy that only 
my people know; how do you like it? what do you 
think about it? how do you account for it? — do you 
find rejoicing millions singing the h}Tmis of Bob 
Ingersoll. Herbert Spencer, Heinrich Heine, Charles 
Darwin, or Francois Voltaire? (Cynics never sing; 
and Skepticism overs praises only in a B-flat mono- 
tone,) 

Thus it always shows consideration for the honest 
doubter. It bows to him, and says: I am thy serv- 
ant, command me. It recognizes the fact that 

** There lives more faith in honest doubt. 
Believe me, than in half the creeds." 

It reaches forth a friendly hand to the sincere seeker 
after truth. He may still be in some *'far country," 
and it may be "feeding swine"; it matters little pro- 
vided he has '*come to himself," realizes that he is 
perishing with hunger while even his Father's serv- 
ants have ''bread enough and to spare," is yearn- 
ingly looking homeward, and is prayerfully plan- 

112 



ning deliverance from the unhallowed environment 
of his riotous life. It says to its disciples : There is 
hope for the man who has come to his senses, who 
has begun to think, whose conscience is awakening, 
whose eyes begin to see the light, whose ears begin 
to hear new voices from on high, whose softening 
heart begins to pulsate with new life. 

When the cry comes: ^'hiit up your heads, O ye 
gates; and be ye lift up ye everlasting doors; and 
the King of glory shall come in! " man has a right 
to inquire, ^^Who is this King of glory?" And the 
coming One respects that right. Here, indeed, is 
man's momentous duty; he neglects it at great peril. 
It would be most unfortunate were he to thought- 
lessly throw^ open the gates of his life to every so- 
licitor who came, saying, "1 am Christ"; for many 
false Christs arise who, alas, deceive many. So 
man's fair question is fairly answered: ^^The Lord 
strong and mighty, the Lord mighty in battle." 

Still man may hesitate. It w^ould be a serious 
mistake if he did not. It may be this One w^ho 
seeks admission is an imposter — the world is over- 
run with imposter s. Therefore the cry comes again : 
^'Lift up your heads, O ye gates; even lift them up 
ye everlasting doors; and the King of glory shall 
come in." And again man calls down from the 
watch-towers of his anxious soul: ^'Who is this King 
of glory?" To which challenge the King replies 
with renewed consideration: ''The Lord of hosts, 
he is the King of glory." Then, convinced of the 
righteousness and justice of the Divine claims, yet 
not till then, let the gates be lift up! 

113 



An Appeal to the Heart 

Christianity makes a corresponding appeal to the 
heart. With intelligent sympathy it takes the senti- 
ments into consideration. There is no sentiment in 
the world's callous Commercialism; but in the 
King's business, thank God, there is. With a throb- 
bing soul it comes to the throbbing souls of men. 
It pulsates, thrills, and lets love flow freely into all 
the arteries of human life. Having exalted and 
convinced the judgment it seeks to satisfy the soul. 
The inquiring mind it does not despise ; the longing 
heart it does not disappoint. 

It is the world's only call to the wanderer: ''Seek 
ye the Lord while he may be found, call ye upon him 
while he is near: let the wacked forsake his way, and 
the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him re- 
turn unto the Lord, and he will have mercy upon 
him; and to our God, for he will abundantly par- 
don." It weeps over the wayward: ''O Jerusalem, 
Jerusalem, which killest the prophets, and stonest 
them that are sent unto thee; how often would I 
have gathered thy children together, as a hen doth 
gather her brood under her wings, and ye w^ould 
not ! " It pardons the penitent, even when the scribes 
and Pharisees, the hypocritical devotees of Eccle- 
siasticism, pleading the execution of ''justice" in the 
name of the majesty of the Mosaic law, are ready to 
cast stones: "Woman, w^here are those thine accus- 
ers? hath no man condemned thee? Neither do I 
condemn thee: go, and sin no more" — for the blus- 
tering representatives of Legalism had been com- 
pelled to slink off before Him who was the God of 

114 



grace. It satisfies the famishing, whom the world 
has forsaken: ^^Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye 
to the waters, and he that hath no money; come ye, 
buy, and eat; yea, come, buy wine and milk with- 
out money and without price. Incline your ear, and 
come unto me: hear, and your soul shall live; and 
I will make an everlasting covenant with you, even 
the sure mercies of David." 

Christianity is the Good Samaritan of the ages — 
the world has known no other ; it pours in its oil and 
wine, to cleanse the wounds of the world, to take 
away their smart, and heals them every one — and 
it does it without regard to race or place, in utter 
forgetfulness of self. It bandages the broken spirit 
of the world, forgives its iniquities, heals its dis- 
eases, redeems its life from destruction, crowns it 
with loving-kindness and tender mercies. It takes 
down the silent harp of the world from the hopeless 
willows of despair, and stirs the night with seraphic 
music. It fills the empty cup of failure with the 
fullness of transcendent triumph. It tenderly in- 
vites the weary and oppressed, enters the dark doors 
of earth's dungeons, and delivers men from the gray 
gloom of remorseful ignominy. It lifts the leaden 
load of melancholy and conscious sin, rescues the 
perishing, cares for the dying, and bursts through 
the dread fastnesses of the tomb into everlasting vic- 
tory. It strikes the dry rock of the desert and makes 
it gush with streams of living water. It beautifies 
the barren landscape of man's degenerate life, and 
makes it fragrant with faith, golden with the rich 
harvests of gratitude. 

115 



Men have seen the sandy beach shattered and 
torn by the ruthless tramp of ten thousand thought- 
less, pleasure-seeking feet, which in the early hours 
of the day stretched out, as far as the eye could 
reach, chaste and lustrous, the burnished setting of 
an emerald and turquoise sea. They have seen it 
mangled and moaning, all its glory gone, deserted 
by the reckless rioters to whom it bared its virtuous 
bosom to make for them a holiday. And then, as 
the hours sped on, they have watched the unwearied 
waves of the flowing tide run higher and higher, 
up and up, billow chasing billow, hither, thither, on 
and on, until, by and by, at the fullness of the flood, 
every wound had been healed, the last deep scar ef- 
faced, and all trace of the day's fierce struggle for- 
ever obliterated, while the blazing sunset cast its 
streams of glory across that selfsame strand re- 
deemed, a strand of glittering gold, like "a. pure 
river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding 
out of the throne of God and of the Lamb." 

Thus the full flood of Divine love heals every 
ragged rent in the heart of man, erases the scars of 
sin and sorrow, covers his life with the beautiful 
garments of joy, and crowns his soul with rapture 
that only the redeemed can know. 

Christianity is "a. religion by which to live, a re- 
ligion by which to die; a religion that cheers in dark- 
ness, relieves in perplexity, supports in adversity, 
keeps steadfast in prosperity, and guides the in- 
quirer to that blessed land where the wicked cease 
from troubling and the weary are at rest." 

116 



There is but one outlook for a religion like this; 
as truly as God lives all the ends of the earth shall 
rejoice in the realization of its infinite grace and 
power. 

Christianity Cosmopolitan 

Christianity is a cosmopolitan religion. "Such is 
its intrinsic excellence that it is adapted to the wants 
of all, and it provides for all." It is suited to all 
classes, conditions and nationalities , everywhere and 
always. It sings with the child, calculates with the 
man, meditates with the aged. It weeps with the 
sorrowful, rejoices with the prosperous, and sows its 
sweet salvation beside all waters. It was the taper 
in the sepulchral catacombs of ancient persecution, 
the torch of deliverance during the dark ages, as it 
has been the guiding star and enlightening sun of 
our present civilization. It is a Messianic messen- 
ger to the Jew and genuine scholarship to the Greek, 
emancipation to the Barbarian, faultless science to 
the Scythian, liberty to the bound and a law of life 
to the free, an excellent cure for political corruption 
and the only solvent for sin in all its manifestations 
and in every sphere. 

No geographical boundaries can shut it in. No 
national frontiers can limit its outlook. No racial 
exclusiveness can stop its progress. No Chinese 
wall can nullify its effectual grace. No creature, 
clime, class, or condition can say: You are not for 
me. It cannot be 

"cabin'd, cribb'd, confin'd, bound in 
To saucy doubts and fears.'' 

117 



No prison walls can restrain its going forth; no 
chains can fetter its essential freedom. 

It is not a national religion. It is not an anti- 
national religion. It is not an inter-national re- 
ligion. It is a super-n^tioml. It has nothing di- 
rectly to do with Nationalism, except to redeem it 
by enlightening, elevating and redeeming the indi- 
vidual citizens who comprise it. It stands over and 
above political government, touching it only through 
the regenerate minds, hearts and lives of the people 
personally. Its function and sphere are exclusively 
moral and spiritual. 

Except in the same sense, it is not an industrial 
religion, not a religion of Socialism so-called, not 
a racial religion, not the vicious Marxian ^ ^religion 
of a class in revolt," not a sectarian religion, not a 
materialistic religion. 

A good ship does not repudiate the restless sea, 
nor its diversified currents and cross-currents; it 
does not deny nor disregard its boisterous, clashing 
waves; but constantly pouring oil on the troubled 
waters, it rides serenely through and above them all, 
throughout the whole world, to its desired haven. 
Thus does Christianity address itself to man^ 
without invidious distinctions, or entangling alli- 
ances, that would restrict its cosmopolitan char- 
acter. From God it came, and to God it will re- 
turn, carrying in its mighty hold the precious freight 
of immortal souls from ^^all the kindreds of the 
earth." 

A little while ago an ardent disciple of Millennial- 
ism ^ ^estimated" roughly (roughly, indeed) that 

118 



there were in the world '^but nine million regenerate 
persons" — he being one of them, of course! Such 
presumptuous speculations and personal vanity are 
but characteristic of the most offensive Pharisaism. 
In any case we know that it is one of the many pre- 
tentious pronouncements of Ism, which would take 
judgment, the times and seasons, out of the hands 
of God into its own. 

Meanwhile we also know that Christianity is a 
world religion, yet not worldly; its weapons are not 
carnal, but spiritual — not human, but Divine — not 
temporal, but eternal — not material, but moral and 
spiritual. 

''Translate the w^ords of Christ into what coun- 
try's language you will, He might have been the off- 
spring of that country. Date them by what cen- 
tury of the world you will, they belong to that cen- 
tury as much as to any other. There is nothing of 
nationality about Christ. He was the child of every 
age and nation. His was a life world-wide." 

A Religion of Life and Enterprise 

Christianity differs from every other religion, 5^- 
called, in the fact that it is positive, not negative, 
essentially constructive and never destructive, up- 
lifting and not debasing. Genuine religion is a life; 
and life is always positive and constructive, elevat- 
ing and ennobling. Ism is negative and ruinous, 
dishonoring and degrading. 

And it is most unfortunate that Judaism and 
Christianity so. largely have been confused. The 
Judaism of the Old Testament, in the Providence 

119 



of God, was the forerunner of the Christianity of 
the New Testament. Christianity sprang out of 
Judaism historically, and they must be considered 
together as the kernel and the shell; for neither can 
be interpreted or understood without the other. But 
Christianity is by no means Judaism. In the inter- 
est of truth and salvation a clear line of distinction 
must be drawn between them. Therefore, since the 
very day the old shell cracked, and the tree of Life 
came forth in resurrection power and glory, Juda- 
ism, having served its divinely appointed purpose, 
has been a cast-away; and it will never come back. 

Judaism is legalistic from beginning to end, while 
Christianity from beginning to end is gracious and 
free from the law. With all the power of His Di- 
vine personality, Jesus threw Himself and His new 
testament against Legalism. By it the world was 
and is bound ; but by Him is the world rescued from 
that tomb and made free. Having passed from the 
period of its youth into the age of personal responsi- 
bility, the law, its '^schoolmaster," ceased to be to it 
in any sense a means of grace, and became an actual 
menace. 

'Tor the law ('Thou shalt not') made nothing 
perfect, but the bringing in of a better hope did." 
The old Mosaic law was but "a shadow of good 
things to come, and not the very image of the 
things." The law "worketh wrath" — it did in 
Paul's day, and it is doing it yet. But Christianity 
worketh, not fear and vengeance, but gratitude and 
faith; for "by grace are ye saved through faith." 

120 



The law came by Moses, but grace and truth by 
Jesus Christ. 

The world languishes and groans under the gall- 
ing yoke of Legalism; and ever and anon it breaks 
away in riotous rebellion. Recently a state legisla- 
ture, in a single session, passed eight hundred and 
sixty-five laws — and was thereupon complimented 
by the governor of the state for its almost unprece- 
dented moderation! 

Every enemy of Christianity, every friend of Ism 
— Militarism, Socialism, Romanism, Radicalism, 
Confucianism, Legalism, and all the numberless 
other Isms — the friends of ''fire and sword/' of 
falsehood and fiction — thumb their way laboriously 
back through the legalistic labyrinths of the old 
ceremonial, law-bound Judaism to find passages to 
prove their point, recently including three presi- 
dents and ex-presidents of the United States — they 
evide77tly know the nselessness of searching the 
Christian Scriptures of the New Testament for 
proof texts to sustain their erratic contentions. 

Confucius said to his deluded followers: ''Don't 
go near the water; you might fall in and drown.'' 
But to the drowning man he had nothing to say — 
except, perhaps, 'T told you so." And the whole 
human race is fallen into the river of death. He 
gave men some excellent advice concerning the thing 
they should not do, but he offered them no way of 
escape from the inexorable consequences of the 
thins; thev had done. And what is true of Confu- 
danism has been true also of every other man-made 
philosophy, or moral system, or so-called religion, 

121 



the world has ever known. Moreover, whenever 
these have essayed to do some pretentious construc- 
tive work, when they have started out to cast up 
some way of escape from things as they are, such 
effort has invariably resulted in a tantalizing tower 
of unutterable nonsense, an absurd futility, 
founded on the shifting sands of Materialism and 
topped with pestilential mist. Meanwhile every one 
of them has capitalized the errors and superstitions 
thus engendered, and has done it at great material 
profit. 

Religion, so-called, has been the most unconscion- 
able profiteer the world has ever known. 

Ism is a leech; Christianity is a life. Ism sucks 
the life-blood out of others into itself; Christianity 
transfuses its own life-blood into others. Ism works 
under the law without grace; Christianity works 
under grace without the law. To one the law is a 
grindstone; to the other it is at most a stepping- 
stone. The victims of the one are fettered ; the fol- 
lowers of the other are free. And thus the true and 
the false in religion are easily differentiated. 

By grace and love and faith, in the self-forgetful 
sacrifice that springs out of fidelity to truth, Chris- 
tianity goes in after that drowning man — by posi- 
tive purpose, by constructive enterprise; and by 
deeds of deliverance it lifts him out of the dark, 
turbulent river of death into a glorious life, a life 
that is ^^hid with Christ in God." 

Christianity is therefore an enterprising religion, 
a life-giving religion. With no weapon but Truth, 
with no armor but Love, with no force but Faith, 

122 



it goes down into the gambler's hell, up to the king's 
throne, and out to the ends of the earth. Some one 
has said that not a Pagan temple has been built in 
a century; Christianity builds two temples to the 
living God a day. 

No continent is too dark for its love to enlighten. 
No jungle is too dense for its unselfish pursuit of 
Divine purpose to penetrate. No sea is too wide or 
stormy for its zeal to cross. No cloud is too por- 
tentious for its flash of enthusiasm to pierce. No 
wall of national, racial, ecclesiastical, or social 
bigotry is too high for its strength of character to 
scale. No cliff is too steep for its patient continu- 
ance to surmount. No depth is too great for the 
reach of its redeeming grace. No task is too diffi- 
cult for its devotion to duty to undertake. No 
amount of opposition. Cynicism and persecution is 
sufficient to stay its onward march. 

Art, invention, science, commerce, education, true 
patriotism, philanthropy and benevolence, all genu- 
ine reform, find in it an open home and an abundant 
inspiration. In its conceptions of the Divine nature 
and its standards of morality, the relation of man to 
God, and of men to each other, it is not only far in 
advance of Paganism and every other Ism, but is in 
a class by itself. In effectual accomplishments for 
the public good and the salvation of society it is 
without any possible competitor. 

Fear not, O man of God! Be strong and very 
courageous. Lift up the gracious standard of the 
cross without misgiving or dismay — not a prosti- 
tuted, superstitious Thing, but an all-conquering 

123 



spirit and purpose of Life. Such a religion as this 
must inevitably endure, notwithstanding the falter- 
ings and faults of its followers; and notwithstand- 
ing the rude antagonism of the Godless. There is 
in it the very essence and soul of triumphant con- 
quest. 

Come on, chariots of Egypt — it will engulf you 
as of old ! Come on, sword of Assyria — it will turn 
your ill-tempered edge upon your own presumptu- 
ous neck, as when the ancient psalm-singer slew the 
insolent giant of Gath! Come on, sons of Anak, 
v^ith your fro\^Tiing, cloud-capped philosophies — it 
v^ill show you how its God doth put down the 
mighty from their seats, and how certainly He ex- 
alteth them of low degree! For in human experi- 
ence its cause is just and right; in reason's ear it is 
fully vindicated; it satisfies the hungry heart; it 
does things with overcoming mastery and enthusi- 
asm, with industry and sacrifice of self, with fidelity 
to Truth. 



3. The Testimony or Revelation 

And, finally, what does God say about it? 

With many men it is a matter of indifference what 
God says about it, or about anything else. They are 
exceeding wise — in their own conceits. What they 
have to say is sufficient and conclusive — to their own 
muddled, misguided minds. They prefer the de- 
lirious railings of a puzzle-headed infidelity to the 
luminous assurances of revealed truth. Let some 
cynical, superficial mountebank speak, and they 

124 



greet his profane mouthings with prolonged ap- 
plause; but they have no ear for the symphonious 
music of true faith. 

Yet there remain, even to this day, not a few who 
continue to think God is at least deserving of a re- 
spectful hearing. These are they who are conscious 
of the fact that man has followed the headlong guid- 
ance of the human mind, a myriad times or more, 
into the rancid mire of hopeless ruin; that he has 
accepted the wild conclusions of unregenerate hu- 
man reason invariably to his dismay. The utter 
smallness and superficiality of the human mind is 
the most constantly amazing thing of record in the 
experience of the truly enlightened. To err is hu- 
man. Since he allowed the Serpent of Schism to 
get in between him and God, man has done nothing 
but err. His mentality is defective in its every exer- 
cise. His deepest thoughts are childish. His heart 
is above all things deceitful and desperately wicked. 

The thing he sometimes calls ^'conscience" does 
not in fact exist, except conditionally. For con- 
science is only the awareness of some discrepancy 
that may exist between a man's act-life and his 
thought-life — it is only a register of variations be- 
tween his deeds and his ideals — it is but the con- 
sciousness of conflict between his conduct and his 
creed, between ivhat he consciously is and what he 
consciously ought to be. And where no such dis- 
crepancy, or variation, or conflict exists, his so- 
called ''conscience" does not exist — it is said to be 
"dead." In other words, when he is living on pre- 
cisely the same low level with his degraded ideas of 

125 



living, when his creed and his deed are equally de- 
bauched, he is ^'conscienceless." When his ideals 
(if he ever had any) have been sacrificed to selfish- 
ness, the lust of empire, he is without '^ conscience"; 
there is no discrepancy between deed and ideal, for 
the ideal has vanished, or has been utterly pros- 
tituted ; there is no notable contrast between conduct 
and creed, for creed has been crucified; there is no 
perceptible variation between his '4s" and his 
^'ought," for his ''ought" has been completely sub- 
jugated by the Imperialism of his "is"; there is no 
conflict between behavior and belief, constantly cry- 
ing aloud for settlement — he is "dead" in trespasses 
and sin; there is no "voice" appealing to him in the 
silent watches of the night, or in the tumult of the 
* noonday, persistently calling to him to bring his 
lagging front line of action up to the advanced stan- 
dard of his nobler purpose, for that standard has 
disappeared with that purpose in the dust of his 
laggard, self-centered living. Jimmy Logue, the 
notorious burglar, was totally devoid of conscience, 
seemed to have not the slightest sense of wrong- 
doing, because his degraded idea of right tallied ex- 
actly with the debased business in which he was 
engaged. 

This "voice," in itself, is therefore without virtue 
or vision in fact, without wisdom or worth; or at 
best it is but the croak of a frog in a bog, the con- 
fused murmuring of turbulent waters, the flighty, 
vanishing echo of an absurd hallucination, a spent 
breath — a voice that is not vocal. Thus the "Ap- 
peal to Reason" is only an appeal to treason — and 

126 



trash; the appeal to ''conscience" is only an appeal 
to a boat without a bottom in the midst of a surg- 
ing sea, 

A Voice from Heaven 

But there is ''a voice from heaven" that calls down 
through the centuries clear as a clarion, a voice that 
man has never followed to a fall, a Divine guidance 
that has never led man to dismay, a conclusion that 
has ever crowned him with gratitude and content- 
ment. And that voice carries on, through storm and 
tempest, through the shot and shell of human com- 
petition and strife, above the rude rivalries of a God- 
less Commercialism, the sinister scheming of sub- 
marine diplomacy, and the insensate lust of empire, 
above the riot and rot of social decomposition — car- 
ries on forever. 

Therefore, what does God say about it? This 
is the only hopeful question human inquisitors have 
ever asked. And man is never safe until he has 
safely anchored in the secure haven of its inspired 
answer. A single 'Thus saith the Lord" has in it 
infinitely more wisdom and power, more grace and 
goodness, than all the voluminous pratings of ra- 
tionalistic philosophy, the counting-room conceits of 
carnivorous Commercialism, or the wild-eyed lo- 
quacity of a blasphemous soapbox. 

The man who trusts the human mifid leans on a 
broken reed. The man who trusts the human heart 
looks to a light that fails. The man who trusts the 
human will follows the voice of a vagabond. But 
he that trusts in the Lord shall be as Mount Zion, 
which cannot be removed, but abideth forever. — 



^*If thou hast run with the footmen, and they have 
wearied thee, then how canst thou contend with 
horses? and if in the land of peace, wherein thou 
trustedest, they wearied thee, then how wilt thou do 
in the swelling of Jordan ?'' 

The conclusions of human philosophy are not 
-final; they are but the bungled ending of a be- 
fogged beginning. But the Word of God is final, 
and full of life. It only is truth. Truth only is 
efficient. Only truth is sufficient. It cannot return 
void — and it alone. Falsehood comes back with 
nothing but hot air in an arid desert. A lie 
languishes, and fades away into night. But truth 
prevails, and finally brusts forth in the supernal 
glory of eternal day. Crushed to earth it will but 
rise again. The heavens and the earth shall pass 
away; this monstrous Materialism will vanish like 
a noxious vapor; the riot of races, the cries of the 
classes, the mad maneuvering of the masses, and 
the vain imagining of the nations, move steadily on 
over the giant's causeway of eternal decomposition; 
but the Word of Truth endures. The foundation 
of God standeth sure. It is forever settled in 
Heaven. 

Man's thoughts are an infectious disease, Man's 
opinions, however pretentious, are pestilential. The 
common sense of the world is a circle without a cen- 
ter. The heart of mankind is sick of the putrid 
machinations of blustering statesmanship. Man's 
so-called ^^peace" never stays put, and simply be- 
cause it is a pusillanimous, self-seeking subterfuge. 
The kingdoms of the world are utterly corrupt from 

128 



top to bottom; and sedition is of the Devil, essen- 
tially as well as in all its manifestations. 

There is nothing more unsocial than the schis- 
matic thing called ^^Socialism/' Let no man be de- 
ceived; the worst things in the world are cunningly 
camouflaged with the best names in the world. In 
its fundamental principle and characteristic spirit 
the socialism of Christianity is as different from the 
pretentious ^^Socialism" of the day as is a genuine 
gold coin from its ingenious counterfeit — yet only 
the trained eye or hand can tell them apart. One is 
standard and free from alloys; the other is a de- 
ceptive base metal mix alloyed with error. They 
look alike to the average eye, they sound alike, and 
they feel alike; but they are essentially different 
throughout. \ 

The unity of ^'Unionism" is simply one more fic- 
tion. There is no fraternity in Christless * ^Brother- 
hood." So-called ^'Federation" is built on a bub- 
ble. And the ^' Independent" workers of the world 
do not represent even the a-b-c of independence, 
they are simply caged cockatoos. 

What the world needs is not a Declaration of 
Independence, but a declaration of dependence, 
of dependence on God, on Divine control and guid- 
ance, on the mediatory love and amalgamating grace 
of Jesus Christ, on deep-seated Mutuality, which 
exists only '4n Him" and in the crucifixion of Self. 

The world is weary of war, this war of words, 
idle words, vain words, lying words, insidious 
words, weasel words — this boasting Babel of con- 
fused tongues, sinister tongues, crafty tongues, wild 

129 



and untamed tongues, serpents' tongues, tongues 
that just talk, talk, talk; these ever-multiplying and 
always-changing leagues of notions ; these garrulous 
compromises and loquacious competitions that in- 
sult wisdom, conceal truth, subvert justice and cover 
crooks — ^^my little children let us not love in w^ord, 
neither in tongue; but in deed and in truth." 

Therefore let God speak. The Lord is in His 
holy temple as of old; let all the earth keep silence 
before Him, listen to His voice, and follow the 
vision of a Divine Redeemer, of whom God hath 
said, ^^This is my beloved Son; hear HIM." A 
riotous multitude of human interpretations and 
propositions has left man crushed and dazed. Now 
for one clear call from above! He has staggered 
and stumbled along the tortuous calf-paths of hu- 
man vagary and inordinate self-esteem; now^ let 
him turn into the King's high Way that leadeth out 
of this wilderness of mendacious Materialism 
straight into the promised land of life and liberty. — 
Through sixty centuries of destructive tumult and 
strife has man been speaking; now let God speak. 
What has God to say about it? 

Thus Saith the Lord 

^^The poor man may know nothing of history, 
science, or philosophy; he may be totally unable to 
vanquish the skeptic on the arena of public debate; 
but in every ^Thus saith the Lord' he is surrounded 
by a panoply which the shafts of infidelity can 
never pierce." In God's Word he has a Rock to 
stand on which the lustful Isms of time and sense 

130 



can never undermine; a life-line to hold to that no 
Schism society, or Board of Trade, or scissors of 
Hired Criticism, or commercial Trust, or industrial 
enterprise, or university laboratory, can part 
asunder; a vital composition that cannot be de- 
composed by any acid test that science can possibly 
apply; a Declaration of Principles that will not 
perish; a Constitution that never need be amended 
or modified, the like of which the combined wisdom 
of all the philosophy and statesmanship of the world 
cannot devise; the only possible basis of peace; the 
only ground that justice and right can stand on. 
And there is no other word under Heaven given 
among men whereby they can come to an under- 
standing, and society be saved from self-destruc- 
tion. -- 1 

The wTiter sat for several hours in a compart- 
ment of a French railway carriage, alone with a 
stranger. The day was hot and the journey tedious. 
We exchanged many friendly glances as time 
passed. But mere glances were not satisfying. We 
tried to get together on some better basis; but our 
efforts were fruitless. He spoke in French. The 
writer replied in English. Neither understood the 
other. We tried German, but to no avail; our 
broken words failed us utterly. We took refuge in 
Latin; but could not come to an understanding. 
We found pencil and paper with a resort to Greek, 
and then to Hebrew; but, though we succeeded in 
getting a little closer together, everything was mud- 
dled and confused. For all our earnest desire and 
effort of hours we could not understand; and the 

131 



time of parting was at hand. As we drew up to the 
station of our destination w^e looked at each other 
in gracious despair. Must we part, and strangers 
still? the journey at an end, without knowing each 
other, without understanding each other? We ex- 
clianged nicely engraved personal cards; but how 
meaningless they were ! What were mere names to 
us, however artistically etched on copper plate? 
They simply mocked the passion of our deeper pur- 
pose — and left us strangers still. Then a sudden 
inspiration seized my French companion ; and a new 
light lit up his prepossessing face. He quickly drew 
from his pocket a copy of the New Testament. 
Putting one end of it in the writer's hand while he 
held the other end, his eyes moistening with joy as 
he spoke, he said simply and slowly: ''Hoc inter 
nos'' (^^This between us") — and instantly the con- 
fusion of tongues was gone, our differences were 
dissolved! We had gotten together at last, we had 
come to an understanding, the war of words was 
over, peace prevailed; and we finished the journey in 
mutual joy, friends forever on the firm foundation 
of God. 

^^Other foundation can no man lay." 
Human ''Justice'' is the blindfolded image of a 
squint-eyed fact. But ^^the law of the Lord is per- 
fect, converting the soul: the testimony of the Lord 
is sure, making wise the simple. The statutes of 
the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart; the com- 
mandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the 
eyes. The fear of the Lord is clean, enduring for- 
ever : the judgments of the Lord are true and right- 
ist 



eous altogether. More to be desired are they than 
gold, yea, than much fine gold: sweeter also than 
honey and the droppings of the honeycomb. More- 
over by them is thy servant warned : and in keeping 
of them there is great reward." 

The Word of God has justified itself in human 
experience through unnumbered generation's. There- 
fore it lives. The ^ ^sacred'' books of Ism — of Hin- 
duism, Brahminism, Buddhism, Mohammedanism, 
and all the rest — in due course lose their superficial 
luster and pass aw^ay. But the Word of God is 
never out of date. The great libraries of the world 
are vast cemeteries filled with dead books. Some 
of them struck at local wrongs that have been reme- 
died; some fulfilled their mission and disappeared; 
some defended institutions that no longer interest 
the human race; most of them contained no virtue 
that warranted continued existence — not even in the 
judgment of the most generous critics. But the 
Bible lives. It belongs to no special age, to no 
isolated locality, deals with no institutions of merely 
transitory interest, advocates no cause that is limited 
geographically, nationally, socially, religiously, or 
in any other respect. It concerns all men, every- 
where, and in all times. 

The most up-to-date book man has ever known is 
the Bible. As a matter of fact it is always ahead- 
of-date. It anticipates man's knowledge of men and 
things, all his discoveries, often by the measure of 
many centuries. For four thousand years history 
and science have been trying to catch up with the 
Bible, and trying in vain. Away back in Moses' 

133 



time God in this Book revealed the fact that the phy- 
sical earth was hung out in space on nothing. 
Science at last agrees, and now calls this nothing 
^'gravitation/' and looks learned. But not so many 
generations ago science w^as teaching the school chil- 
dren that the earth w^as flat, that it rested on the 
back of a great elephant, and then on the back of a 
great turtle, and then on the back of a great man 
called Atlas. So science is catching up. 

History and Science Catching Up 

For twenty-five centuries the name of Sargon, 
king of Assyria, was completely lost to secular his- 
tory; and the learned historians, with their char- 
acteristic Dogmatism, said that there never had been 
an Assyrian king by the name of Sargon; that the 
Bible was entirely wrong in its account of how this 
Pagan king invaded and devastated Judea. But 
only recently, in the ruins of ancient Ninevah, they 
dug up the cylinder of Sargon which records in de- 
tail, and beyond all peradventure, his incursion 
against the Jews. Then the learned historians be- 
lieved it. They would not believe the Bible; but 
they believed this cylindrical stone. So history is 
catching up. 

Distinguished physicians are now telling the 
mothers of the world that they will have to go back 
to the Mosaic code to discover how to properly care 
for their children. So science is catching up wath 
the Bible. 

Thousands of years ago the Bible proclaimed 
Democracy the only proper form of government, 

134 



under God as the only sovereign ruler. It spoke 
openly and strongly against temporal potentates, 
kings and princes ; it denounced Imperialism in un- 
measured terms. So that when the children of 
Israel came to the prophet Samuel demanding a 
king, that they might be like the Pagan nations 
around them, he plead with them against it; and he 
told them in the plainest language what would come 
of it. Indeed his historic words on that occasion 
read as if they had been penned by some specially 
inspired democratic statesman but yesterday. Yet 
for almost countless centuries the political econo- 
mists of the world preached Imperialism, and even 
an apostate Ecclesiasticism vied with the kingdoms 
of this world in the interest of a human pope, a tem- 
poral potentate, an absolute autocrat, the very cli- 
max of imperialistic pretensions. So political 
science today is beginning to catch up with the 
Bible, the last empire but two (lorded over by two 
little islands) having disappeared from the face of 
the earth, the last remaining kings being but the 
mummies of a system that God denounced away 
back in Samuel's day, a system that God permitted 
but did 7tot ^^ordain" in the popular sense of the 
term, and permitted because He would not auto- 
cratically deny to men whom He had fuade free the 
thing which they wilfully insisted on having. 

Partnership and co-operation, as opposed to com- 
petition, w^as set forth by the Bible thousands of 
years ago as the only possible basis of social and 
industrial justice; and the world is just now^ begin- 
ning to awake to the fact that society must be put on 

135 



a partnership basis, that industry must be co- 
operative, that capital and labor must share both 
the profits and the responsibilities of industrial ac- 
tivities, that commercial competition is synonymous 
with commercial war, that such war is destructive 
and not constructive, and that only in partnership 
and co-operation can the world have peace, justice 
and satisfaction. 

Less than twenty-five years ago ^^competition is 
the life of trade" was the universally accepted motto 
of the commercial world, which is now declaring on 
every hand that competition is the death of trade, 
the prolific source of industrial, social and spiritual 
decomposition, and that Commercialism must elimi- 
nate the ^^ism" and get together, or die by its own 
hand. Capital, therefore, has been organizing num- 
berless ' 'combinations" and so-called '^trusts," and 
labor has been organizing fifty-seven or more varie- 
ties of ^'unions," ^^federations" and "brotherhoods." 
And most recently these two hostile camps have been 
openly and right ardently flirting with each other, 
by various signs and more or less clandestine con- 
ferences suggesting wedlock. 

So industrial and social science is at last catching 
up with the Bible in a few of the essentials of life 
and liberty. 

Perhaps the next step will be to unconditional 
neighborliness, community of spirit and interest, 
property and life, which Christianity has taught for 
nearly two thousand years, and which the Christian 
church at one time practiced, before Materialism so 
largely possessed it, before it fell for ''the kingdoms 

136 



of this world and the glory of them," before it 
strayed from liberty into Legalism, from grace into 
force, from fidelity into politics ; before the cross of 
Jesus was prostituted and became the criterion of 
temporal power and political empire; before that 
gracious cross was lined up with the ^ ^crescent" as a 
messenger of '^fire and sword" — ^'In Hoc Signo 
Vinces," the battle-cry of a ruthless Commercial- 
ism, the shell hole of Hell ! 

But the world, therefore, will have first to learn 
that a Christless ''Communism'' is a demoniacal de- 
bauch; that ''brotherhood" without Jesus is a faked 
mix of no value; that unions, federations, trusts, 
covenants and leagues with The Prince of Peace 
left out, are simply the alluring figurehead of a uni- 
versal and destructive fiction, essential war camou- 
flaged with fetching names and put under bond to 
the powers that prey. Government on any shoul- 
ders but His has demonstrated, not only its utter 
incompetency, but also its utterly sinister character 
and aims, from the very hour it repudiated God and 
set up for itself. The Christ idea without the Christ 
is a deadly delusion and a destructive snare. 

The apostate world is beginning to see some 
things, however, and laggard science is catching up 
with the law of life laid down in the Word of God. 

The Bible is the only book that is never out of 
date. The Bible is the only book that is always up 
to date. The Bible always leads, it goes before, in 
all things; it never follows. All of which can be 
said of no other book in human history. Therefore 
the Bible lives. Therefore should men consult it as 

137 



the court of last resort. Therefore should they know 
it more intimately, obey it more implicitly, pass it on 
more earnestly. 

The Book of Books 

That illustrious maker of great books. Sir Walter 
Scott, when on his death-bed, said to one who 
watched by his side, ^^Hand me the Book". ^^Which 
book," was the instant response. ^^There is but one 
Book", he replied. 

Scott knew that ^^the statutes of the Lord are 
right." Man's statutes are not. The statutes of 
the state are not. The Bible is the only righteous 
book; and it is the most authentic of books. There 
is no such evidence that Shakespeare wrote '^Ham- 
let", or that Milton wrote 'Taradise Lost", or that 
Scott wrote ^Tvanhoe", as there is that Almighty 
God, by the hands of prophets, evangelists and 
apostles, wrote this Book of books. 

The most popular book in the world today is the 
Bible; just as the most popular institution is the 
Christian church, and the most popular name is the 
name of JESUS. // there is any other institution 
in the history of the human race that has brought 
such manifold blessing to the world as the Christian 
church, we openly challenge any man to mention it. 
If there is any other name in human history that 
will in any respect compare with the name of Jesus, 
we unhesitatingly challenge the world to point to it. 
If in the vast libraries of the race there is any other 
book that even approaches the grace and majesty of 
the Bible, we dare any man to make a laughing- 
stock of himself by producing it. 

138 



The Bible is the truest of books. Learning and 
science, socalled, constantly confirm the truth of 
the sacred Scriptures. Every stroke of the archeo- 
logist's hammer, every thrust of the geologist's 
crowbar, the piercing eye of the strongest micro- 
scope and the far-seeing eye of the most powerful 
telescope, bring to light new evidence of their 
accuracy. 

The Bible is right in doctrine. In its main issue 
it deals with man the sinner and Jesus Christ the 
Savior. It is the only hook with salvation in it. 
It is the only book that points out a Way of life. 
Have the ages produced a man without sin? We 
challenge the world to tell us who he was. But who 
convicteth Jesus of sin? Let him who thinks he 
does stand forth and say it if he dare. As to His 
power to save, witness the personal testimony of ten 
thousand lepers, redeemed in our own day and gen- 
eration. 

The Bible is the only book that teaches men what 
mercy is, and that above all the barbaric terror of 
the times there is an infinite heart at the center of 
the universe. The vaunted new ^'Humanism" 
stands forth today the same old savage. The most 
human thing we know is falsely called ^ 'man's in- 
humanity to man". There is more mercy in the 
venomous fang of a rattlesnake, or in the vicious 
tooth of a hyenOy or in the powerful paw of an 
African lion, than in the historic treatment by man 
of the unfortunate of his race where Christianity has 
not exerted a potent influence. But God says, in the 

139 



personal words of His Eternal Son, '^Blessed are the 
merciful, for they shall obtain mercy." 

The Bible is always right in its effects; and like 
fragrant flowers, it is always appropriate. 

^'The statues of the Lord are right.'' The philos- 
ophies of man are wrong. In man's age-long yet 
vain search for a substitute for God and revealed 
truth, Confucianism has again been brought for- 
ward by some erratic souls, with considerable boast, 
as the noblest philosophy. Confucius w^as the 
founder of Chinese philosophy; and the best that 
can be said of Confucianism is China ! Confucius 
was born 551 B. C. ; and Confucianism has had 
China all to itself for twenty-five centuries. With 
what result the w^orld now knows quite well. Man 
gets no where by idle negations. It is utterly useless 
for the human race to try to deliver itself from the 
abyss of sin with a rope of nots fastened at the other 
end to a wind-lass of words. 

It is related of Confucius that, while on a journey, 
he was waylaid by a political enemy, who would not 
release him until he had promised that he would 
not proceed to his destination. When the philoso- 
pher was released, in spite of his promise, he con- 
tinued his journey. Asked why he had broken his 
w^ord, he replied, '^It was a forced oath; the spirits 
do not hear such". Today, after two and a half mil- 
lenniums, mendacity is universal among the many 
m.illions of China and Japan, who show no shame 
at being found out in a lie ; truth is discounted as a 
childish canard ; a man's word is not worth a willow 
whistle, and nobody can safely believe anybody or 

140 



anything ; for they say that their great teacher was a 
liar, and that he taught that a lie that does no known 
evil is not wrong. 

So much for Ism. Ism is a lie, and the father of 
it. Ism justifies falsehood. Its chief propaganda is 
untruth. It delights in deception and cultivates 
fraud. It everywhere teaches the Devilish doctrine 
that it is right to do wrong if no apparent harm 
comes of it, or if good may come of it. Infidelity has 
ever taught the same infamy. Robert G. Ingersoll 
taught it openly. Ism teaches that ^^the end justifies 
the means"; yet no fair end has ever been attained 
by foul means. To wit : the mendacious millions of 
Confucianism, the most backward, hopeless, help- 
less, deceitful, degraded, unreliable, lie-loving peo- 
ples among the great nations of the earth. 

But the Word of God stands foursquare for truth 
under any and all conditions and circumstances. 
Therefore the Bible lives. 

The Folly of Infidelity 
Some years ago that dissolute scoffer, Ingersoll, 
declared in a public lecture that the Bible was an 
exploded book, that its sales were bound to fall off 
rapidly, and that within ten years it would be little 
read. Since then six great Bible houses have been 
established, and the sales of the Bible have been 
more than quadrupled. In a single year the Ameri- 
can Bible Society alone issued more than 1,500,000 
Bibles. The same year the British & Foreign Bible 
Society alone turned out more than 5,000,000 
Bibles. The total issues of that one year, of the 
English Bible alone, were more than 10,000,000 

141 



complete copies, not including 20,00,000 copies of 
parts of the Book. This was greater than that of 
any one hundred of the most popular books com- 
bined. The Oxford Press of itself produces 20,000 
Bibles a week. These require 40,000 sheets of gold 
just for lettering the volumes ; and the skins of more 
than 100,000 animals go into the covers of the 
Oxford Bible every year. The several societies print 
the Bible in 500 different languages, reaching from 
pole to pole, and ^^from the river unto the ends of 
the earth", so that men continue to exclaim in 
Pentecostal amazement, ^'How hear we every man 
in our own tongue, wherein we were born; we do 
hear them speak in our own tongues the v/onderful 
works of God". 

And all this, nineteen centuries after date of orig- 
inal publication of the completed Book! — though 
it was foretold in a tiny kingdom lying off the east- 
ern shore of the Mediterranean sea, by an inspired 
psalm-singer called David, more than ten centuries 
before Christ. 

^^The Bible is the one uplifting hook. It is a liv- 
ing force. During all these centuries it has been the 
mightiest influence the world has known. We have 
it today; we are carrying it everywhere; and wher- 
ever it is, it clearly evidences the fact that it belongs 
to the present. It influences thought. It changes 
character. It shapes desire and destiny. Cast the 
Bible into corrupt, fickle, treacherous, selfish, pleas- 
ure-loving Greece, or into the stern, merciless heart 
of iron Rome, and immediately there is a change. A 
new humanity appears. Out of that life men and 

142 



women spring up who are tender, pitiful, loving God 
and man; rejoicing in truth and holiness; bearing 
the burdens of the weak ; sorrowing with the sorrow- 
ful; abiding with the stricken, from whose presence 
all others flee away. We recognize in these Bible- 
loving and Bible-moulded men and women the long- 
lost sons and daughters of God." 

''In less than a hundred years," said the rabid 
Voltaire, ''Christianity will be swept from existence, 
will pass into history". Infidelity ran riot in France, 
red-handed and impious. A century and more has 
passed. Voltaire has passed into history, and not 
very decent history either; hut Christianity still lives. 

Tom Paine also demolished the Bible, finished it 
off finally. But after he dropped into a drunkard's 
grave in 1809 the Book took such a leap that since 
his time more than twenty times as many Bibles 
have been made and scattered through the world as 
ever were before, altogether, since the creation of 
man. 

What fools these mortals be! 

Therefore, what "saith the Lord"? For "all 
scripture is given by inspiration of God". This is 
God's Book. God is its author. Forty or fifty men 
would never have written such a Book, except under 
Divine direction and control. Their book would 
have been a smoother, softer book; a book with less 
outspoken, rounded-out truth in it; a book without 
any seeming "discrepancies", or "inconsistencies", 
or "mistakes" in it. It would have been an easy- 
flowing and "consistent" narrative concealing much 
more than it revealed. 

143 



There is a consistency of testimony that is always 
suspicious, that immediately suggests collusion, 
careful rehearsal in some dark corner ; and there is 
an apparent disagreement of testimony that immedi- 
ately suggests and gives assurance of sincerity, 
honesty, frankness and truth. If men wrote the 
Bible, on their own initiative, by and of themselves, 
and for their own account, they wrote their own 
doom, an open and fearful indictment of themselves, 
their friends, disciples and heroes. Uninspired men, 
men just as they are, speaking of and for themselves, 
without direct dictation from on high, not moved by 
the Holy Spirit, have never written any such thing 
since time first was. They would not and could not 
do it, though selected from the world's greatest and 
best, and shut up for forty years or more together in 
one place under the most favorable conditions. 

But in the Bible there are sixty-six books, pro- 
duced from time to time during a period of sixteen 
centuries, by forty or fifty different authors, widely 
scattered geographically, representing various sta- 
tions and walks of life — kings, farmers, the most 
distinguished scholars and the most illiterate fisher- 
men, of different nationalities, races, tastes and sur- 
roundings, lawyers and lawTnakers, publicans and 
Pharisees, shepherds and physicians, rich and poor, 
the social leader and the social outcast, illustrious 
warriors and the followers of the arts of peace, 
powerful politicians and obscure artisans — in the 
Bible these sixty-six books are finally brought to- 
gether into one compact, consistent volume, with one 
idea of God, sin, immortality, and salvation by faith 

144 



thru the blood atonement of the Son of God, running 
all through it — a volume that all the principalities 
and powers of earth and Hell, by frontal attacks and 
insidious flanking movements, by ridicule, sarcasm, 
and sinister schemes of '^sapping" and submarining, 
by bonfires, secular and ecclesiastical interdicts, and 
threats of torture and death, have not been able to 
pick to pieces or destroy in nineteen centuries. Never 
has a book excited such fierce and fiendish animosity 
— yet the Bible lives I 

''What a book!" exclaims Heinrich Heine, the 
licentious infidel and brilliant critic, 'Vast and wide 
as the world; rooted in the abysses of creation and 
towering up into the blue secrets of heaven; sunrise 
and sunset, promise and fulfillment, the whole drama 
of humanity, all in this book! " It was the rational- 
istic Ewald who said to Dean Stanley, "In this book 
is all the wisdom of the world". Sir Isaac Newton 
testified, "We account the Scriptures the most sub- 
lime philosophy". Even that wild and erratic yet 
erudite skeptic Rousseau remarked, "I must con- 
fess the majesty of the Scriptures astonishes me". 
The distinguished infidel-evolutionist Thomas Hux- 
ley (he of the "primordial protoplasm") admitted 
openly, yet with the most complacent self-conceit, 
that he had been "seriously perplexed to know how 
the religious feeling, which is the essential base of all 
conduct, could be kept up without the use of the 
Bible". Charles Dudley Warner wrote frankly, "A 
boy or girl in college, in the presence of tasks set for 
either to master, without a fair knowledge of the 
Bible, is an ignoramus, and is disadvantaged ac- 

145 



cordingly. It is in itself almost a liberal education, 
as many great masters in literature have testified. It 
has so entered into law, literature, thought — the 
whole modern life of the Christian world — ^that 
ignorance of it is a most serious disadvantage to the 
student". Bishop Wordsworth found in Shakes- 
peare alone at least 550 references to the Scriptures. 
And the esteemed Matthew Arnold said, "To the 
Bible men will return because they cannot do with- 
out it; the true God is, and must be preeminently, the 
God of the Bible." 

The Essential Strength of Revealed Truth 

All of which is very fine and true. Yet most of 
these noted men have not been honest enough to tell 
the world why these fine things are true. It is likely 
they all knew why, not perfectly perhaps, but quite 
well enough. With all their learning and scholarly 
attainments, however, their wit and wisdom, the 
extent to which they were dominated by pure per- 
versity and prejudice is at least conspicuous. Skep- 
ticism always is perverse. Infidelity always is dis- 
honest. And it is significant, too, that the historic 
enemies of Christianity, the aggressive critics of the 
Bible, the brilliant infidels of the world, have almost 
invariably been men of the most dissolute character, 
drunken, licentious and profane, brutal at home 
and abroad, a scandal to their friends, untrue to 
their most sacred social obligations, sacrilegious, 
false to their own convictions, and traitors to their 
native land. 

146 



The real secret of the Bible, of its staying power, 
of its acceptance among all races and among all 
classes, is not found in any of the more or less super- 
ficial and comparatively unimportant facts and cir- 
cumstances above related — not in its excellence as 
literature, not in the sublime poetry of Job and 
Isaiah, not in the incomparable histories of the 
Pentateuch, not in the matchless Proverbs from the 
pen of the illustrious Solomon, not in the charming 
love story of the Song of Songs, not even in the lofty 
ethics of its Mosaic Law and its Sermon on the 
Mount. ^, 

It has become a dominant world-book because it 
is the Word of God, the Word of Divine x\uthority, 
and because, as such, it reveals an all-sufficient 
Redeemer as '^the Lamb of God, which taketh away 
the sin of the world,'' It is what it is in human 
experience because it makes the love, holiness and 
justice of God known to lost men, unlovely, unholy 
and unjust, in the person and work of God's Son, 
the Lord Jesus Christ; because it brings to the 
troubled conscience the ^^peace of God which passeth 
all understanding"; because it leads believers into a 
fulness of joy and satisfaction that can not be found 
elsewhere ; because it displaces despair with a glori- 
ous hope by the ^^resurrection of Jesus Christ from 
the dead" ; because it has given to the world, with all 
their human faults and limitations, by far the 
noblest and best men and women, the highest type of 
manhood and womanhood, the world has ever 
kno\ATi ; because it presents to its faithful confessors 
^^an Advocate with the Father, even Jesus Christ the 

147 



righteous", whose advocacy at the bar of Divine 
Justice has never lost a case; because, through the 
blood of Calvary's cross, it shows man a Way of 
eternal Light and Life in the midst of the sepuchural 
darkness of sin and death. 

It is to the blood atonement of the crucified Son of 
God that the Bible owes its attractiveness and power, 
a full and free salvation to all believers ; and in the 
last issue it is nothing but this that has captivated 
countless thousands of worshippers, brought them 
boldly and joyously to its efficacious mercy-seat, 
without any other mediation than that they have in 
Him, without any interloping, pay-as-you-enter 
scheme of hierarchical heresy and graft. 

''Know thyself," said the ancient philosopher. 
''Knovv^ God, and Jesus Christ whom He hath sent," 
says Christianity. It is impossible for a man to 
know himself until he knows God. His knowledge 
of himself is a comparative thing; and it concerns 
his past, not only to the hour of his birth, but on 
back through his most ancient ancestry up to the 
moment of his creation and the footstool of his 
Father's throne. It also concerns his future; not 
only to the gateway of his tomb, but on to the utmost 
bound of his eternal destiny. When he can say with 
Job, ''I have heard of thee with the hearing of the 
ear, but now mine eye seeth thee", then and then only 
will he know himself and cry aloud, ''wherefore I 
abhor myself and repent in dust and ashes". Other- 
wise he cannot realize his utter untrust worthiness, 
his utter selfishness, his utter sin, and his complete 
impotency when it comes to the essential matter of 

148 



his personal salvation, a way of escape from an 
accusing conscience, and justification in the presence 
of conscious and inescapeable judgment, u'he^i he 
shall receive the just dues he wished for and lived 
for. What man needs, therefore, is ^^to know God'\ 
He knew God once. He does 7iot know God now. 
And God cannot be known to him, effectually, except 
in the person, word and work of His only begotten 
Son. ^'No man hath seen the Father at any time; 
the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the 
Father, he hath declared him.'' 

''What a word is this I for with authority and 
power he commandeth the unclean spirits, and they 
come out.'' And *Svhat manner of man is this! for 
he commandeth even the winds and the water, and 
thev obev him". 

What, then, does God say about it? Witness the 
testimony of revelation. Thus saith the lord: 
^^\s truly as I live, all the earth shall be filled with 
the glory of the Lord". 

But some will say. How shall this thing be? Thou 
foolish one; the secret of the Lord is with them that 
fear Him, and well they know that ''in the Lord 
Jehovah is everlasting strength". Force? No; not 
that. There is no strength in force; a little child 
shall lead it. Gravitation holds the material earth 
in place with its socalled mighty grip ; but a toy bal- 
loon, released by baby's hand, successfully defies it, 
and sails away. The massive, deep-seated rocks of 
the volcanic mountain are utterly incapable of with- 
standing the processes of disintegration as God plays 
His sunshine and rain upon them. Force is a fooVs 

149 



fiction. Even man himself, amid all his limitations^ 
lays his hand upon the tremendous thunderbolt, 
binds it with a tiny wire, makes it obey his human 
will, illuminate his home and drive the wheels of his 
invention. There is no might in Militarism. The 
boasted strength of battleships is a silly snare. The 
power of princes is a passing mist. A horse is a 
vain thing for safety. The wisdom of the world is 
dishwater. The J^assionate pursuit of temporal' 
empire is a positive yet petty pestilence. The pre- 
tentious machinations of man are a mendacious yet 
mediocre mockery. 

But His cross shall stand as long as the sun and 
moon endure. For ^^he shall come down like rain 
upon the mown grass: like showers that water the 
earth. In his days shall the righteous flourish; and 
abundance of peace so long as the moon endureth. 
And men shall be blessed in him: all nations shall 
call him blessed. For the earth shall be full of the 
knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea.'^ 

This is what God says. And what God says set- 
tles it. What man says unsettles it, Ernst Heinrich 
Haeckers ^^riddle of the universe" is solved in five 
familiar letters : j-e-s-u-s — letters found only in the 
alphabet of Truth, an alphabet that the learned 
Haeckel never learned. Let wars wage on, let 
tumults rage, let strifes rend and Ism seek to dis- 
rupt and scatter the very elect; let heresy hiss and 
hireling Criticism raise the censorious standards of 
its imbecility; let a false science sneer and the bla- 
tant billows of a bumptious Scholasticism cast their 
accumulated scum of centuries into the faces of the 

150 



redeemed; let the storm fiend scream and scoff and 
scowl; let disdainful Skepticism publish its libels, 
cowardice crawl into its kennel, and infidelity con- 
tinue to feed upon the fleshpots of an idolatrous 
Materialism — God says it; and that settles it! 

Therefore should His children believe it, work 
and pray for it, press on in spite of adverse criticism, 
active opposition and pessimistic prophecy, seek the 
constant aid of God's Holy Spirit, plan largely and 
liberally, present their bodies a living sacrifice, holy, 
acceptable to God, which is their reasonable service, 
profit by the experience of the past, catch the inspira- 
tions of the future, seize the opportunities of today^ 
give God what they have, however little, however 
much, ^ ^redeeming the time, because the days are 
evil"; for THE LORD OF HOSTS HATH 
SPOKEN IT. 

The Ever Present Jesus 

Shall they idly wait till Jesus comes ? Shall they 
complacently shirk the responsibility and let Him 
do it? May they find excuse for their failure by 
falsely saying that God intended it should be so? 
Has God's Word failed? Is the power of God now 
palsied? Has the Holy Spirit fallen down on His 
job? Have the means of grace proved ineffectual? 
Has the Almighty reversed Himself, and is He now 
willing that many should perish and that only a few 
should come to repentance ? To every question : No ! 
Then what is the matter? This is the matter: Jesus 
sent His followers into the world to he fishers of men, 
and instead they have become fishers of money; they 

151 



have bowed the knee to Baal; they have gone into the 
corrupt politics of the kingdoms of carnality; the 
idolatrous lust of earthly empire has possessed them ; 
they have allowed themselves to become the willing 
worshippers of an infamous Materialism. 

Therefore, leaving it to the theologian to tell us 
whence Christ came, and to the sign-seeking busy- 
body to tell us when He will come again, the fact 
remains that He is here. 

His disciples have belittled this fact; they have 
belittled it far more than they have belittled the fact 
of His second coming, or the fact of His first com- 
ing. 

The minds of most of them have been almost 
entirely preoccupied with the historic Christ. The 
minds of many of them have been almost entirely 
preoccupied wdth the prophetic Christ. And all of 
them have more or less neglected the fact of the 
actual Christ, in their midst, now; as He said, ^'lo, 
I am with you alway, even unto the end of the 
world.'' 

The theologian continues to revel in history and 
historicity. 

The pre-millennialist continues to revel in proph- 
ecy. 

And both of them fail w^hen they forget that the 
cows must be fed, the fields ploughed, the pies put 
in the oven — and that the human race is a re- 
enforced concrete fact fallen into a pit, hungry and 
forsaken, pilfered and exploited by ^'the prince of 
the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in 
the children of disobedience; among whom also we 

152 



all had our conversation {'' anestraphemen'' — had 
the turning of ourselves, or ^'our overturn'') in times 
past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires 
(wills) of the flesh and of the mind, and were by 
nature the children of wrath, even as others.'' Both 
of them fail when they forget that what the human- 
race wants, right or wrong, however worthy or de- 
graded the desire, is a present, practical helper in its 
time of need. 

What does the world care for the dissertations of 
dogmatic theology? What does the world care for 
the speculations of prophecy? What does the world 
care for the Christ of yesterday? What does it care 
for the Christ of tomorrow? Criticize it as we wall 
for living within such contracted horizons, the fact 
remains that it lives in the present and for the pres- 
ent. With all its boast of principality and power, 
its kingdom is restricted to today. Its kingdom is 
bounded on the east by this morning's sunrise, and 
on the west by this evening's sunset, on the south by 
the cornfield of Materialism, and on the north by six 
feet of breathing space. x\nd if we meet it at all we 
must meet it where we find it, where it is in fact, not 
where it should be in theory; we must meet it in its 
own shut-in surroundings, in the little circle of its 
own selfish limitations. We must meet it among 
the tombs. We must meet it in the cornfield. We 
must meet it today. And we must meet it with what 
its present needs seem to it to demand. 

It is folly to berate it for its folly. We face the 
fact that ''this is a desert place, and the time is now 
past"; and it is Ism only that says, ''Send the multi- 

153 



tude away, that they may go into the villages, and 
buy themselves victuals." Christianity says to its 
disciples, ^^They need not depart; give ye them to 
eat." Alas, that for such a time and place as this 
the larder should he empty of everything hut an his- 
toric catechism and some prophetic speculations! Is 
it any wonder that this world under these circum- 
stances and conditions curses creeds, however excel- 
lent and truthful? 

It spurns history. It scorns prophecy. It calls 
for present protection, and for something to eat. It 
comes back to its Father's house, if it comes at all, 
because it is perishing with hunger, and because of 
some awakening consciousness that in its Father's 
house there is immediate satisfaction for its imme- 
diate needs. 

What a miserable motive ! Yet must that motive 
be met as the Father met it, a great way off, run- 
ning out to it, falling on its neck with many kisses, 
taking it by the hand, and leading it home. 

Not to some historic home. Not to some prophetic 
home. But to an actual home, a present home, a 
home whose bounteous board is spread with substan- 
tial facts, not with gilt-edged prospects. 

We condemn the motive. Jesus personally em- 
braced it. And He delivered the goods. But His 
disciples, lacking the goods, seek a way of escape 
from their outstanding failure by haloed maledic- 
tions on the motive. If they took account of stock 
today would they find they had less than a certain 
stray lad caught in the crowd with ''five barley 
loaves (crackers) and two small fishes," scarcely 

154 



a lunch for one rather than a meal for a multitude 
— for ^^What are they among so many?" How lit- 
tle faith would they find in the larder, how little love 
and devotion, how little unselfishness and zeal? 

Nevertheless shall all the earth ''be filled with the 
glory of the Lord," for He is here to make up the 
lacking measure of our insufficiency with His own 
Divine fullness. Therefore ''make them sit down," 
now; and feed them, even in the midst of the desert, 
and notwithstanding the fact that the day is far 
spent. Tarry not till He come again in His glorified 
body to rule the earth in millennial grace and good- 
ness. Do it now! 

When He shall come again the writer does not 
know, and in spite of every pretension no one else 
knows. Moreover the writer does not care to know. 
It is not his business to know. This is God's busi- 
ness. And he does not feel inclined to shift re- 
sponsibility, to turn his back upon present facts and 
opportunities, to leave the starving, plundered mul- 
titudes and go off star-gazing and sign-seeking, or 
to be a curious busybody in matters that God has 
expressly reserved to Himself alone. It is sufficient 
to know that Jesus is here now, in desire and sym- 
pathy, in His power and Providence, in the person 
of His Holy Spirit, in the effectual truth of His 
inspired Word, in unnumbered mercies and means 
of grace. 

The Christian's interest is in the foretold and as- 
sured fact of the prevalence of Christ's Kingdom, 
not in times and seasons; for Jesus Himself said, 
"it is not for you to know the times or the seasons, 

155 



which the Father hath put in his own power.'' The 
Christian's interest is in laying earnest hold upon 
all the divinely appointed means at his disposal, and 
not to declare them impotent and ineffectual; in 
order that, under God, he may help to bring the 
foretold fact to pass as speedily as possible, with- 
out resorting to idle speculations, or vain disputa- 
tions calculated only to satisfy curiosity and mollify 
itching ears. On the contrary he ^'goes to it" as if 
all depended on his faith, fortitude, loyalty and zeal, 
conscious of the fact that his gracious Lord, who 
will come again in His glorified body, is with him 
now. This is sufficient. 



THE FINAL VICTORY OF FAITH 

By the pestilence as much as by the violence of 
the insurrection, the British garrison at Lucknow 
had been reduced to the last extremity. The wrath 
of disease and the ferocity of war had thinned its 
ranks and filled the hearts of its loyal but exhausted 
remnant with despair. The multitudinous regi- 
ments of the enemy, well supplied and fanatical 
with the success that had accompanied the rebellion, 
were pressing hard on its last refuge. The situa- 
tion represented the very climax of distress. Out- 
side that small and beleaguered company there was 
no eye to pity. There was no arm to save. There 
was no commanding voice to quicken and inspire, 
no word to chill the oncoming courage of the revolu- 
tionists. Hope had fled. An anguish of fear was 
in every breast. A languishing cry to Heaven for 

156 



deliverance trembled on every lip. And, then, in 
breathless resignation, they waited, with their wives 
and children, for the apparently inevitable and bit- 
ter end. 

It is related that in that pitiful circle of despon- 
dence a Scotch lassie lay tossing on the hot pillow of 
her fevered cot, her wasted features flushed with the 
last delirious struggle for life. Suddenly she started 
up, seemed to be listening intently, while a lustrous 
gleam lightened her sunken eyes. ^^Hist!" she 
whispered with a strained intensity that immediately 
caught the ear of the weary w^atchers at her side. 
''They're a-comin' — they're a-cominV' she said; 
''dinna y' hear 'em? dinna y' hear 'em?" — And she 
fell back exhausted. 

Presently she started again: ''They're a-comin' — 
they're a-comin'; dinna y' hear 'em? — dinna y' 
hear the bagpipes?" 

As the morning breaketh, that night they came. 
The mightily marshaled legions of a great empire, 
w^ith colors flying, and the highland bagpipes filling 
the very air with the thrill of victory, burst through 
the gradually closing circles of infidel Fanaticism 
and wrought a miraculous deliverance. 

Thus today the fevered ear of faltering faith may 
yet hear the sound of familiar music from the dis- 
tant Fatherland, and the trained tramp of the count- 
less cohorts of the skies, as the Truth goes marching 
on. "They're a-comin' I" The eye of faith, how- 
ever dimmed by the pestilential wastes of the fright- 
ful wilderness of a mendacious Materialism, may 
yet see the myriad helmets of salvation, the breast- 

157 



plates of righteousness, and the Sword of the Spirit, 
glittering in the sunrise of God's good purpose. 
/^They're a-cominM They're a-comin' ! " The num- 
berless armies of the redeemed to the rescue! 
^^Dinna y' hear 'em? Dinna y' hear 'em?" The 
rumble of the chariot wheels of grace in the tops of 
the mountains. The rustle of the multitudes of Di- 
vine mercy in the tree-tops of the forest. Behold 
^^the Lord of hosts mustereth the host of the battle. 
They come from a far country, from the end of 
heaven, even the Lord, and the weapons of his in- 
dignation." — ^'Dinna y' hear 'em?" 

^^ Awake, awake; put on thy strength, O Zion; 
put on thy beautiful garments, O Jerusalem. Sing 
together ye waste places. For the ransomed of the 
Lord shall return and come to Zion with songs and 
everlasting joy upon their heads"; and 

^^esus shall reign where'er the sun 
Doth his successive journeys run, 
His Kingdom stretch from shore to shore 
Till moons shall wax and wane no more." 



158 



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EN Come and Go ; 
Pkiiosopliies Rise and Fall ; 
Science Struts and StumUes ; 
Nations Flourisk and VanisL ; 
TKe Pomp oi Empire 
I9 a Passii^ Mist ; 
Pretentious Bal>ei8 CrumUe 
Into Pestilential Dust; 
But 



THE CROSS 
STILL STANDS ! 




